11 Minn. 57 | Minn. | 1865
By the Gowrt
The supplemental affidavits of the appellants appear to have been received by the court below without objection, and as the statute authorizes the plaintiff to oppose the affidavit of the defendant used on a motion to dissolve an attachment by affidavits, or other evi
The only serious question in this case is, whether false representations made in May, in regard to his pecuniary ability, by which the respondent effected a purchase on credit of the appellants, which purchase was subsequently paid for in full, could, without any further communication between the parties in reference to the respondent’s circumstances, be kept alive and carried along, as it were, so that the wrong impressions created could be treated as operating upon and inducing'subsequent credits in September and October following. We extract the following paragraphs from the decision of the judge below: “ The representations charged to have been made were made in May, 1864, and it appears from said affidavit, that the debt then contracted was paid, and that the goods for which this action is brought were purchased in September after, and that the plaintiffs relied upon the representations made in May previous. We are of opinion that that fact would not prove that the goods were purchased on the faith of such representations, unless so stated and agreed between the parties that on the faith of these representations all subsequent purchases were to be made.” We understand this to be a conclusion of law, and we think it is erroneous. An analogous question arose in Zabriskie v. Smith, 3 Kernan, 322. There
We think there is good sense, justified by daily experience, in the doctriné enunciated in Zabriskie v. Smith. Where one man induces another to deal with him and to give hire credit by false representations as to his business condition, and when the credit is based entirely (as in this case) on such representations, and would not have been given without them, and shortly afterwards further credits are given' though without fresh representations, it would naturally follow in the absence of any thing to the contrary, that the subsequent credits might be and probably were influenced by the information obtained from the party himself in the first instance. Under such circumstances the course of dealing has its origin in fraud and deceit, and parties ought to be held responsible
In the second place, when we take into account all the affidavits used upon the hearing below, a still stronger, and to us quite satisfactory case, is made out in support of the attachment. Without entering into particulars, it is quite apparent that the debt was fraudulently contracted, and the other requirements of the statute in regard to the allowance of attachments seem to be complied with.
The order vacating and dissolving the attachment is accordingly reversed.