7 S.D. 408 | S.D. | 1895
Appellant and respondent were partners in the mercantile business. The partnership was dissolved, and, concurrently therewith, respondent sold his interest in the assets of the firm, except as hereinafter noticed, to appellant, Trumbower, and one Della Dona. Each partner had, at and before the dissolution, an overdrawn account upon the books of the company. Prior to the dissolution a mistake was discovered in appellant’s account,
The case was tried by the court without a jury and judgment rendered for plaintiff. Defendant appeals, and contends that the evidence is insufficient to sustain the findings of the court upon which the judgment rests. If the only question were whether this item of $900 was a proper and legitimate part of the “book accounts” of the firm, we think there could be but one answer. The items out of which it grew were regularly charged to appellant, with other débils; but in totalizing the several items so charged the sum of $152.23 was extended, instead of $1,052.28 as it should have been. If the same error had occurred in the account of a customer, the error would have been corrected, and the account so corrected would have been subject to equal division between the partners. In this case, however, appellant insists that the circumstances attending the settlement between these parties as partners show that it was their understanding and intention that this $900 was treated as an independent item, segregated from the book accounts, and, by itself, settled and disposed of between them, and therefore not included in the general agreement for an equal division of the book accounts. A memorandum was made and agreed to as the basis of their settlement. In this memorandum, showing the assets of the firm, this $900 appeared as a separate item, called “B. F. T.’s Overdraft,” and was not included in the amount denominated as “Book Accounts.” Respondent's explanation of this is that the $900 was an item by itself, the “book accounts” of the memorandum being only the aggregate of debits as they appeared from the books of the firm, by which