12 S.D. 59 | S.D. | 1899
Whether appellant is liable for the deficiency remaining after the foreclosure of a mortgage on real property is the sole question presented on this appeal from a judgment of that character and from an order denying a motion for a new trial. On the 7th day of June, 1886, through the agency of the American Investment Company, a corporation, respondent loaned to Will B. Stearns $735, due December 1, 1891, with interest at 7 per cent, per annum, payable semi-annually, as evidenced by a principal note and six coupon interest notes, each for $25.72, all of which were secured by a mortgage on land; and payment thereof was at the time, for a valuable consideration, guarantied by the American Investment Company, at maturity or within two years thereafter. When the mortgage had matured, and the guaranty above mentioned became operative, and at a time when the Ormsby Land & Mortgage Company held the legal title to the mortgaged premises, a contract extending the time of payment for five years from December 1, 1891, was entered into, expressly continuing in force all the conditions, covenants, and agreements contained in the mortgage, and by which payment of all money due or to become due, thereon, including the principal note, was assumed as follows: “In consideration of said extension, the said George J.,'Consigny,Jr.,Sec.,hereby agrees to pay interest on said note
Evidently upon the theory that ambiguity exists as to the capacity in which George J. Consigny, Jr., executed the papers by which the extension was effected, the court very properly admitted in evidence • several letters written by the parties in interest to respondent, together with testimony of certain witnesses, from which it might well be found that appellant knowingly acqiosced in,and received the benefits of, the contract of extension, thus ratifying all that was done, and the question of original authority was rendered immaterial. “A voluntary acceptance of the benefit of a transation is equivalent to a consent to all the obligations arising from it, so far as the facts are known or ought, to be known to the person accepting.” Comp. Laws, § 3524.. The circumstances of this case bring appellant clearly within the doctrine of the forego