10 Ga. App. 380 | Ga. Ct. App. | 1912
The case arises on money-rule to determine the rank and validity of certain liens claimed by various creditors upon the proceeds arising from judicial sale of the crops raised in the year 1910 by a tenant upon a plantation of- Miss Yorus, the defendant in error. The case, as presented in this court, narrows to a single question: Did Miss Yorus have a valid landlord's lien for supplies ? The facts are as follows: At the beginning of the year 1909, she furnished to this tenant corn, fodder, cottonseed, and cane, as crop supplies for that year. These articles were consumed, of course, during the year, but at the end of the year the tenant had
The ordinary rule among creditors is that equality is equity. Hence, laws giving special liens are strictly construed; and the person claiming a special lien must show that he is plainly within the law under which he asserts it. Nevertheless, common sense must prevail as to this, as well as in regard to other propositions of law and of equity. The law gives a landlord a special lien on the crops of his tenant for such necessaries as the landlord may furnish in order to make that crop. Back debts due from the tenant to the landlord can not, by any agreement between the parties, be counted as advances to make any new crop. No tacking is to be allowed; no estoppel can raise the lien. Parks v. Simpson, 124 Ga. 523 (52 S. E. 616). Cf. Fountain v. Fountain, 7 Ga. App. 361 (66 S. E. 1020). And under the decision in Parks V. Simpson, supra, if the tenant at the end of the year 1909 had simply said to his landlord, “I can pay you now, but let the indebtedness go over, to be paid out of next year’s crop,” and the landlord had acquiesced, no lien would have arisen. But law and common sense both differentiate that ease from the case at bar. In this case the corn, etc., furnished the tenant in'1909 were to be repaid in kind (though, perhaps, that makes no great difference), and at the end of the year there was in the crib and other places of storage, ready to be delivered, if called for, more than enough corn, etc., to make the repayment. The landlord’s agent went to the place to arrange this matter and to make contracts for the coming year. The rent for the }rear 1910 was agreed on. The landlord’s agent said to the tenant, “I suppose you will need that corn, fodder, hay, cottonseed, and sugar cane in making another crop.” The tenant replied in the affirmative. The agent then told him to go ahead and use it and to repay it out of the 1910 crop. This transaction amounted to constructive delivery of the corn, etc., from the tenant to the landlord, and redelivery from the landlord to the tenant. If' there had not been enough of these articles on hand to repay the
Judgment affirmed.