Case ID: dc_3/html/0663-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Bank of Columbia v. James Moore.
    The Court refused to instruct the jury, that the casual acknowledgment of the debt to a stranger is not such an acknowledgment as was sufficient to take the debt out of the statute of limitations.
    Assumpsit upon the defendant’s promissory note, payable to G. Docker, or order, and by him indorsed to plaintiffs.
    Upon the plea of limitations, the plaintiffs’ witness testified that he overheard the defendant say to his companions, who were no parties to the note, that he owed no debt, excepting one $500 note to the Bank of Columbia.
    Whereupon Mr. Jones, for the defendant, prayed the Court to instruct the jury, that the evidence aforesaid did not import such an acknowledgment of the debt in question, as was sufficient to take it out of the statute of limitations.
   Which instruction the Court (Cranch, C. J., contrá,) refused to give, and the jury rendered their verdict for the plaintiffs.

The defendant’s counsel moved for a new trial, on the ground of error, in refusing the instruction; but the Court, believing that the justice of the case was with the plaintiffs, refused to grant it.

The counsel for the defendant then applied to the Chief Justice, Marshall, and obtained a writ of error to the Supreme Court, where the judgment was reversed, in 1832. (See 6 Peters, 86.)