100 N.Y. 256 | NY | 1885
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The plaintiffs' right of recovery depends upon the effect of defendants' letter of July 9, 1880, read in the light of the surrounding circumstances. What these were, the evidence establishes without dispute or controversy, so that no question of fact remained for the consideration of the jury, and *260
no error was committed by the trial court in treating the case as involving only a question of law. (Underhill v. Vandervoort,
Van Asche Co. would draw sixty-day drafts upon the defendants and procure funds by their sale, remitting the proceeds by short drafts purchased, thus in each instance putting the defendants in funds with which to meet their acceptances; and a continued repetition of the process operating to postpone the final payment of Van Asche Co. and carrying their debt through the agency of defendants' credit. It was to this process and this mode of renewal that Van Asche Co. referred in asking an extension, and to the same process that defendants referred when they in substance requested the renewal of the $37,000 as a temporary arrangement in advance of a final consent or refusal to extend liquidation to the next crop. Upon this understanding of the correspondence both parties acted. *261
Van Asche Co. drew upon the defendants at sixty days, and having sold drafts for $15,000, remitted that amount to defendants, who expressed surprise and cabled to Havana the inquiry "why only $15,000; must send $22,000 first steamer," to which Van Asche Co. replied "$22,000 Saturday steamer." It is beyond question that the defendants perfectly understood that these remittances were the product of drafts drawn on them in the usual way, and in accordance with the request contained in their letter. Van Asche Co. sold their draft on defendants for $22,000 to the present plaintiffs, who were shown the letter of authority, and parted with their money upon its faith. Payment of the drafts having been refused, this action was brought. It is conceded that an absolute authority to draw is equivalent to an unconditional promise to pay the draft; (Merchants' Bank v.Griswold,
No error was committed on the trial, and the judgment should be affirmed, with costs.
All concur.
Judgment affirmed. *262