Case ID: misc_14/html/0286-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Bischopp, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Henry Hess & Co., Respondent, v. Frederick Baar et al., Appellants.
    (New York Common Pleas
    General Term,
    November, 1895.)
    .A promise to pay, made by the alleged principal' with knowledge of all the facts, is a ratification of 'the unauthorized act of the person who assumed to act as his agent and renders him liable as an original debtor.
    1 .An error in the charge to which the attention of the trial justice was not called'by a sufficiently explicit exception, in which event it might have been obviated, is not ground for reversal.
    
      Henry Hess & Co. v. Baar, 11 Misc. Rep. 619, affirmed.
    Appeal from a judgment of the General Term of the City -Court of Hew York, which affirmed a judgment for the plaintiff rendered at trial term upon a verdict in its favor.
    Action to recover the agreed price upon the sale .and delivery of merchandise by the plaintiff corporation' to the defend.ants as copartners.
    
      Robe & Keller, for appellants.
    
      Louis W. Stotesbury, for respondent.
   Bischopp, J.

The record discloses that the merchandise, ■consisting of cigars, for the recovery of the price of which this action was brought, was purchased by one Hugent, who in that regard represented himself to the plaintiff to-be, arid .assumed to act as, the agent of the defendants, but who, in fact, had no such authority. A ratification by the defendants •of Nugent’s act, however, appeared from the testimony of one Deutsch, the plaintiff’s agent, such testimony being to the -effect that subsequent to the sale and the delivery of the merchandise to Nugent, one of the defendants, Wehnke, with knowledge of all the circumstances, told Deutsch, with reference to the merchandise, that it was all right,” and in his ■presence instructed one Fausten, the defendant’s representative, to pay the plaintiff the amount of its demand. The motion for dismissal of the complaint, made when the plaintiff rested its case, was, therefore, properly denied.

The motion for dismissal of the complaint was not renewed, nor was the direction of a verdict .for the defendants asked for when both sides had concluded their introduction of evidence and the cause was about to be submitted to the jury. Hence, we are precluded from all inquiry as to whether at that stage •of the action there was sufficient evidence to support, a verdict for the plaintiff. Schwinger v. Raymond, 105 N. Y. 648; Paige v. Chedsey, 4 Misc. Rep. 183; Meyers v. Cohn, Id. 185.

In his charge to the jury the trial justice, commenting upon-the defendant Wehnke’s promise to pay the plaintiff’s demand, said : “ If you believe this testimony, such a promise would be sufficient consideration for the payment of this bill and would make the- defendants liable as original debtors,” to which the defendants’ counsel excepted as follows: I except to the proposition that if this promise was made it made the -defendants the original debtors.”

It is beyond all controversy that the ratification by the alleged principal of a contract made by another who assumed in that-regard to act as the former’s agent is an adoption of the contract by such alleged principal and subjects him to liability thereunder the same as if the contract was sanctioned by him at its inception. 1 Am. & Eng. Ency. of Law, “ Agency,” subt. “ Eatification,” p. 429 et seq., and cases collated in -note 2. .

One error appears in the charge, but as the attention of the trial justice was not called thereto by an exception sufficiently explicit, in which event it might have been obviated, such error does not now afford ground for reversal. Baylies Til Pr. 239, and cases there collated. ’

Judgment affirmed, with costs.

BookstaveR and" Pryor, JJ.,. conbur.

Judgment" affirmed, with costs.