Case ID: mass_7/html/0393-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "\n      By the Court.\n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Nathaniel Parker versus Caleb Hanson, Jr.
    The payee of a promissory note, who had endorsed it with a saving of his own liability, was received as a competent witness to prove an alteration of the note after its execution.
    Assumpsit bn a promissory note of the following tenor, viz. “ Vass. 23, 3 mo. 1803. Value received, I promise to pay Bartholomew Taber, or order, seventy-five dollars, in three years from date, interest. Caleb Hanson, Jun.—Attest. Elihu Hanson.”
    On the back of the note were the two following endorsements, viz. “ I am not to be holden; for value received, pay the contents to Nathaniel Parker. Bart. Taber.”
    “ The endorser is holden, but the signer is to be called, on first, and myself next. Elihu Hanson.”
    At the trial upon the general issue, at an adjournment of the last October term, before Thatcher, J., the signature of the note by the defendant, and the regular endorsement of it by Taber, were admitted ; but it was suggested, on the part of the defendant, that the note had been altered since *it was executed, [ *471 J and it was insisted that by such alteration it had become void. To prove the alteration, the defendant called Taber as a witness, who was admitted by the Court, though objected to as incompetent by the plaintiff; and he testified that the note had been altered, since it was made, by changing the figure 5, in the date of the year, into the figure 3, thus making 1805 into 1803. He testified, also, that it was in the hands of Elihu Hanson for some time before it was endorsed by him, Taber, and he did not know whether, at the time of his endorsing it, he noticed the alteration, nor whether it was made before or after his endorsement; but he was certain that the alteration was not made before the note was put into the hands of Elihu Hanson, as before stated. He further testified that the note was actually made and signed in March, 1805, and was in his hand-writing.
    A verdict was returned for the defendant by consent, subject to the opinion of the Court, whether Taber was a competent witness to prove the facts to which he testified.
    
      Mellen for the plaintiff.
    
      Wilde for the defendant.
   By the Court.

The question submitted is, whether Taber was a legal and competent witness. He was not interested in the event of the suit, since, by his special endorsement of the note, he had protected himself from all liability upon it. But it is suggested, that he ought not to have been admitted within the rule which forbids a party to a negotiable security to impeach it as originally void, The rule does not apply to the facts of this case. The note is not objected to as originally void, but as having been frauduently altered ; and this the witness was competent to prove.

Judgment on the verdict. 
      
      
         [No such rule exists in the common law. — Ed.]