Case ID: scl_13/html/0457-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Justice Nott\n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Crayton & Sloan vs. Geo. W. Collins.
    The declarations of the payee of a note, made before endorsement against his interest, áre admissible, but not after he has endorsed it. An endorser to anotemay be a witnessto prove that he endorsed it,' after it became due.
    Tried at Barnwell, before Mr. Justice Huger.
    
    Assumpsit on Note.
    THIS was an aetion on a promissory note made by the defendant, and payable to McKennie fy Co. or order, of Augusta, who endorsed it to the plaintiffs.
    The defence was payment; and with a view of letting in a receipt of Samhins, one of the firm of McKennie Co. it was attempted to prove that the note had been endorsed after it became due.
    A book was introduced, purporting to be the bank book of McKennie <§• Co. with the bank of Augusta, as ais» of Samkins, as agent of the defendant with the bank. In this book were several entries in the hand writing o?' Samkins, who had removed to Alabama. There werct also Some figures and calculations in that part of the book which contained the defendant’s account with Samkins, as his bank agent, apparently made after the note became • due, which, it was contended went to shew that it had been paid. These figures, however, were in the hand writing of a Mr. Randolph, who lived in Charleston, and not of Samkins. This book was not permitted to be given in evidence.
    The declarations of John McKennie, after the note was. endorsed, were offered in evidence to prove that the trails- ' fer.was made after the note had become due;
    This evidence was also rejected.
    The plaintiffs obtained a verdict, and this was- a motion for a new trial, on the grounds,
    1st. Because, as the book offered in evidence, was the hook of the original payees of the note, under whom the plaintiffs claimed, the production of that book was of itself sufficient, and the defendant was not bound to prove any thing more than it was their book, and it should have gone.to the jury.
    2nd. Because the court should not have rejected as incompetent evidence, the declarations of John McKennie, which were offered to prove that the note had been • paid and that it had been transferred after it became due.
   Mr. Justice Nott

delivered the opinion of the court:

1st. If the book offered in, this case had been a regular kept book, containing the transactions of the drawer and payee of the note, and had contained entries made before the note was transferred, showing that it had been paid, it Would appear to me that it ought to have been admitted in evidence ; but it was a mere private memorandum book,, only intende/1 as a check upon the bank. The entry exhibited. to the court was not made in the usual method of making entries, even in books of that description, hut was a loose memoradum of doubtful import, having the appearance of a calculation supposed to relate to this note. But even the memoradum, such as it was, was not in the hand ■writing of one of the payees, but was made by a stranger who was within the reach of the court, and whose testimon3^ might have been procured. It was not, therefore, such evidence as ought to have been .admitted, and was properly rejected.

Martin, for the motion.

Patterson, contra.

2nd, The evidence offered in the second instance was much of the same character. It was the decl ration of a person respecting a fact of which he might have been called to give evidence. That the endor- er of a note may be a witness to prove that it was endorsed after it became due, was decided in the case of Smith <§• McDow, (I Con. Rep. 277.) Declarations of the payee qf a note before he has endorsed it, when he'alone is interested ancf against his interest, have been allowed to be given in evidence ; but his declarations, after endorsement, which go fo effect the interest of third persons, cannot be received.

The motion, therefore, must be refused.

Justices Gantt, Richardson and Johnson, concurred.