Case ID: serg-rawl_6/html/0539-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Gibson, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Shapley against Garey.
    
      Monday, May 21.
    two mont,ls fr0m its date, the months tiered asC°"¿theralse'expressed,
    to ta°consi-re <]ere.(I calentracts or transtwéerfmañ and man; tat J^cfáipropecteiiyVpenal cases.
    In Error.
    ERROR to the Court of Common Pleas of rnmi tv • County.
    The suit in the Common Pleas was an appeal by Thomas Garey, the defendant, from the judgment of a justice of the peace in favour of Rufus Shapley, rendered upon a single bill signed and sealed by Garey, dated the 10th June, 1816, by which Garey promised, two months after date, to pay to Shapley, his heirs or assigns, the sum of 54 dollars and 45 cents, for value received, and authorised any justice of the peace to enter judgment and issue execution for the above sum, with costs, on default made. The suit and judgment before the justice were on the 9th August, 1816.
    On the-trial in the Court below, the Court charged the jury, that when the word 'month is used in a bond, note, or single bill, the law intends calendar, not lunar months, and that the single bill in this case was not due until the expiration of two calendar months after it was dated and given. To this opinion the plaintiff excepted. The jury gave a .verdict for the defendant, and judgment was entered accordingly.
    Elder, for the plaintiff in error.
    The single bill was payable in . two months from its date, and the question is, whether these months are lunar or calendar ? I contend that they are lunar. The general principle is, that a month in law is lunar, or twenty-eight days, unless otherwise expressed. 3 Bl. Comm. 141. In Jocelyn v. Hawkins, 1 Str. 446, in a contract to deliver stock in one month, the month was construed a lunar month, notwithstanding evidence of the general understanding of merchants to the contrary. The same construction took place in Barks-dale v. Morgan, 4 Mod. 185, where there was a covenant to pay in one month next following j and the Court say, that the common understanding is, that a month is twenty-eight days,, "except in cases of quare impedit. In Dormer v. Smith, Cro«■ Eliz. 835, the same principle is laid down. In the Bishop of Peterborough v. Katisby, Cro. Jac. 166, in relation to the time of collating, the tempus semestre is held to be half a year of 365 days, but it is said that in case of a condition f<5r rent, months are lunar. In Pennsylvania, where there was an imprisonment of one month on an attachment for contempt, it was construed to mean a lunar month. Commonwealth v. Oswald, 1 Dali. 329.
    Ellmaker, for the defendant in error.
    Whatever might have been the original rule of the common law, it is in modern times changed with the alteration of circumstances, and is now adapted to the common understanding of mankind in their transactions. By a month, at present, is not usually understood a lunar, but a calendar month ; ánd in England as well as here, the construction is according to the intent of the parties. In bills of exchange and promissory notes, months are considered calendar months. Chitt. on Bills 277. 1 Johns. Cases 99. As used in the act for recording of mortgages passed the 28th May, 1715, the .word, months, has the same interpretation. 2 Dali. S02. So too, in the acts for the abolition of slavery. 4 Dali. 14S. •
    
      Elder,
    
    in reply insisted, that negotiable-paper, formed an exception to the general rule. In negotiable paper three days grace are allowed. But these exceptions do not apply to a single bill.
   The opinion of the Court was delivered by

Gibson, J.

By the English common law, the time when

this single bill became due, would certainly be computed by lunar instead of calendar months, which are recognised only by the ecclesiastical Courts. In the Courts of common law, the rule is different; because, as it is said in Barksdale v. Morgan, 4 Mod. 185, the month was, in common parlance, formerly understood to mean twenty-eight days, except in the single instance of quare impedit. This tendency of the common law to adapt itself to the feelings and habits of men, as they actually exist in society, instead of moulding their transactions into forced and artificial forms by inflexible rules, is one of its most estimable qualities, and one which, alone. gives it, as a practical system, pre-eminence over every other that has prevailed. But however wise this particular rule may have been in its origin, the reason of it has long ceased ; at least in'this country, where the popular understanding on the subject is so entirely changed, that in all the transactions and business of life, the month is universally estimated by the calendar. The lunar month never enters into the contemplation of any one. Even in England a gradual departure from the ancient notions on the subject, has forced on the Courts, a correspondent departure from the old rule of computation as respects bills and notes, which so fully enter into the current transactions of every commercial people, that, to interpret them by rules that have no relation to the sense in which language is understood by the world, would be attended with insufferable injustice. In that country, as • well as in this, I have not the least doubt' that the intention of the parties will, in a few years, so far .prevail as to change the common law computation of a month, wherever the word is found, in any contract, whether commercial or not ; particularly as we find some of their Judges in latter times, regretting that its meaning had not, from the first, been settled differently. But we have already taken a step in advance of the English Courts, by deciding that where the word is used in the acts of the Legislature without saying more, a calendar month, shall be intended to have been meant. Then why stop there, when the reasons for that decision are equally applicable to the every day transactions of life, and when it is to be supposed that the persons entrusted with the lawmaking power, are better acquainted with legal distinctions, and therefore more likely to use words in their legal sense, than the mass of their fellow citizens. To arrive, therefore, at the true meaning of the parties, in all contracts or trans- ' actions between man and man, we will hold that the term of a month is to be computed by the calendar ; but this is not to affect judicial proceedings, with respect to which we at present decide nothing. There may be a substantial difference between the common transactions of mankind, and the deliberate acts of those to whom the administration of the laws is committed, particularly in penal cases, where the construction is generally to be in favour of mercy. We are, therefore, of opinion that the judgment be affirmed.

Judgment affirmed»