9 Pa. 504 | Pa. | 1848
The question presented in this ease is, whether a debtor who by deed conveys all his property to assignees for the benefit of his creditors, can stipulate for a
The act did not make the assignment void, but said it should be held and construed for the benefit of the creditors.
This is the only provision in the act. Hence, in Blakey’s Appeal, 7 Barr, 449, it was held that judgments confessed to secure creditors are not such preferences as are avoided by the act of 1843, although an assignment for creditors was intended, and was shortly afterwards executed. This case goes far in principle to settle the case under consideration. The legislature knew that the stipulation for a release was in accordance with the spirit of the bankrupt laws of the commercial world, and with the spirit of the age, that where an unfortunate debtor surrenders all his property to his creditors for their benefit, he ought to be allowed to begin the world again untrammelled, for his own benefit and that of his family. They made but the one provision in the act; and to prevent a latitudinarian construction of this one, they declared that all such assignments shall be subject, in all respects, to the laws now in force relative to voluntary assignments. If these creditors all released there would be no preference, and each determines for himself whether he will accept of the terms of the deed of assignment, it having been settled in the Schuylkill Navigation
Decree reversed, and record remanded.