Case ID: ill-app_190/html/0487-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Justice Eldredge", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Hattie F. Kaufman, Appellant, v. Adam Helmick and Howard Helmick, Appellees.
    (Not to be reported in full.)
    Appeal from the Circuit Court of DeWitt county; the Hon. William G. Cochran, Judge, presiding. Heard in this court at the April term, 1914.
    Reversed and remanded.
    Opinion filed October 16, 1914.
    Statement of the Case.
    Action by Hattie F. Kaufman, Adam Helmick and Howard Helmick to recover on a promissory note purporting to have been executed by defendants, payable to the order of J. F. Newbanks for the principal sum of $825. The note was assigned by Newbanks to plaintiff. Defendants filed the plea of general issue, verifled, and also a verified special plea averring that they did not make and deliver said note. A jury returned a verdict in favor of defendant. To reverse the judgment entered on the verdict, plaintiff appeals.
    Abstract of the Decision.
    Bills and notes, § 462
      
      '—when instruction erroneous as ignoring the issue of ratification of the execution of note. In an action on a promissory note, where the execution thereof was denied by defendants and there was evidence tending to show that defendants had ratified the execution by acknowledging the same and by receiving the benefits from the proceeds thereof, held that instructions given for defendants which ignored the issue of ratification were clearly erroneous.
    
      : The - evidence tended to show that Newbanks had signed as surety several-notes executed by defendant $nd' one G. W. Helmick, and that on said notes becoming'due Newbanks induced defendants to sign the note sued on, payable to his order, so that the same might be negotiated and the proceeds used in the payment on the other notes on which he was surety;" that New-banks took the blank note to defendant Howard Helmick arid that Howard took the note to his father, Adam Helmick, and returned it with the latter’s name signed thereto and then signed his own name thereto in the presence of Newbanks and delivered it to New-banks. Plaintiff’s evidence also shows that Newbanks took the note for the purpose of negotiating it to one Stone, who called up Adam Helmick and asked him if the note was genuine, and that the latter told him that it was. Stone then sold the note to plaintiff. There was other evidence tending to show that Adam Helmick asked -for an extension of time when the note became due. The evidence of defendants tended to show that neither of them signed the note nor ratified their signatures.
    Ingham & Ingham and W. F. Gray, for appellant.
    John Fuller and Herrick & Herrick, for appellees.
    
      
      See Illinois Notes Digest, Vols. .XI to XV, and Cumulative Quarterly, same topic and section number.
    
    
      
      Sce Illinois Notes Digest, Vols. XI to XV, and Cumulative Quarterly, same topic and section number.
    
   Mr. Justice Eldredge

delivered the opinion of the court.