55 Pa. Super. 33 | Pa. Super. Ct. | 1913
Opinion by
A. H. Post & Co., of New York City, were “Foreign Freight Forwarders, Custom House Brokers and Foreign Exchange Collectors.” The plaintiff, through their agency, shipped a consignment of merchandise to a purchaser in South Africa. At about the same time he drew on the consignees for the price of the goods. Whether the draft was to the order of Post & Co.; or to the order of the drawer, and by him indorsed, the record does not certainly show, but that- becomes immaterial in the light of the concession of the parties that there was nothing on the face of the draft or its indorsement to indicate aught else than that Post & Co. were holders for value. In point of fact, however, they paid nothing for the draft, made no advances on account of it, and received it only for collection.
On July 16,1908, the bank received a second installment of $261.45 on account of the debt. As before, this amount was credited in the account of Post & Co. and that account then showed a balance of $284.88 due from the defendant' to Post & Co. This included the amount received and credited as above stated.
The plaintiff, in October, 1909, brought this action to recover from the defendant the amount of the second installment referred to. He declares in his testimony that he was advised by Post & Co. that the bank had received this second installment and that he should collect it directly from the bank, but no such notice was given by Post & Co. to the bank, nor by the plaintiff until long after Post & Co. had become indebted to the bank as hereinafter stated. He thereupon made a demand for payment to him, and the bank having declined to pay, he brought the action. Having produced evidence to warrant a finding that, as between the plaintiff and Post & Co., the proceeds of the original draft were his, the plaintiff asserts that under the law the defendant became liable to pay
As the controlling facts in the two cases cited are identical, an analysis of one will be sufficient to disclose the substantial differences between those cases and the one at bar. In First Nat. Bank v. Gregg, 79 Pa. 384, the plaintiff delivered to Brady & Co., a firm of private bankers in the city of Pittsburg, a note made by a debtor in Clarion county. Brady & Co. in turn sent the note to the First National Bank of Clarion and it was collected by that bank from the debtor. At the time the Clarion bank received the note and the proceeds thereof it had permitted, for its own convenience, a large credit balance to accumulate in the hands of Brady & Co. That situation was not caused or changed by the receipt of the plaintiff’s note and its subsequent collection, and it was held that under such circumstances the bank in Clarion could not hold the money of the plaintiff for the-purpose of cutting down the indebtedness which it had permitted Brady & Co. to owe. The core of the decision may be found in the following quotation from the opinion of Mr. Justice Williams: "It is true that they were the apparent owners of the note, and, in the absence of notice of the plaintiffs’ title, the bank had the right to treat them as the real owners. If it had made advances or given new credits to Brady & Co. on the faith of the note, it would undoubtedly be entitled to retain the amount out of the proceeds. But just at this point the defense wholly fails.” Manifestly then, if after collecting the money in Clarion county, the bank had remitted the amount of such collection to Brady & Co., the apparent owners of the note, the real owner could not afterwards be heard in an attempt to collect a second time.
Now in the present case we have seen that on the date
Were anything to be gained by a new trial, we would be unwilling to adopt the language of the general charge in which certain questions of fact were submitted to the jury. But if the ledger account of the bank offered in evidence is accepted as correct, and we understand it to have been so accepted, it would be useless to send the case back for a second trial. The judgment entered by the learned court below was right. That being true, even if the reasons which prompted the entry of that judgment do not appear to us to be sound, the error nevertheless was a harmless one and the judgment should not be disturbed.
Judgment affirmed.