3 Pa. 346 | Pa. | 1846
No case like the present, nor any thing from which a principle applicable to it can be drawn, is found in the books. The note is for the payment of money; it is payable to bearer; and it is payable absolutely: yet it is .obvious that it was not intended to be negotiable in a commercial sense, and that the maker was not to have the usual days of grace. The debt is still between the original parties; and the contract by which it was created is to be interpreted, like any' other, by their actual meaning. If they meant to make, not a promissory note, within the statute of Anne, but a special agreement with power to enter up judgment on it, they are bound by the result as they themselves viewed it. Such is one of the principles of Patterson v. Poindexter, and Boker v. Hazard, 6 Watts & Serg. 231, in which, however, there was no express promise. Nor would a subsequent holder take the paper on any other terms than those expressed in it. It has in it all the parts of a promissory note; .but it has more: it contains not only a warrant to confess judgment with a release of errors, but an agreement to waive appraisement and stay of execution. But 'a negotiable bill or note is a courier without luggage. It is a requisite that it be framed in the fewest possible words, and those importing the most certain and precise contract; and though this requisite be a minor one, it is entitled to weight in determining a question of intention. To be within the statute, it must be free from contingencies, or conditions that would embarrass it in its course; for a memorandum to control it, though endorsed on it, would be incorporated with it and destroy it. But a memorandum which is merely directory or collateral, will not affect it. The warrant and stipulations incorporated with this note evince, that
Judgment affirmed.