102 Ga. 770 | Ga. | 1898
This case by consent was tried in the court below by the judge without the intervention of a jury. The bill of exceptions contains numerous assignments of error, but one only of them was insisted upon.here. It appears from the record, that James W. English, as administrator of Charles JD. Horn, sold at public outcry two hundred shares of the capital stock of the Atlanta Bridge and Axle Company to W. B. Miles at the priceof$15,000, of which the administrator collected and accountedfor $6,000, and the questionis whether or not, under the facts in evidence, he is liable for the,remaining $9,000. At the time of the sale this stock had little or no real value. Upon other shares offered for sale at the same time the administrator was
The law of the case is laid down in section 3447 of the Civil •Code, the terms of which are plain and unmistakable. When the two hundred shares of stock sold for a price greatly exceeding their real value, the estate represented by English was entitled to .the bargain, and it was his duty to take the necessary steps to secxire its benefits for that estate. Failing to do this, the law makes him liable. The sale was fair; and this is therefore not a case where the heirs of the intestate are seeking to profit by an unconscionable advantage taken by the administrator of the purchaser at the sale. The administrator •can not be relieved because he now has in hand the stock itself ready for delivery to the heirs. It is well known that articles sold at administrators’ sales often bring more than they are worth; and it would never do to hold that an administrator could deprive an estate of the advantages of a bargain thus obtained, by keeping possession of the property and tendering it to those to whom the assets of the estate belong. To permit such a thing would not only be going in the teeth of the law, but would also inaugurate an exceedingly bad policy with reference to the administration of estates. .English would be
Judgment affirmed.