Case Name: GEARY against CUNNINGHAM
Court: Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
Jurisdiction: Pennsylvania
Decision Date: 1823-09-22
Citations: 10 Serg. & Rawle 230
Docket Number: 
Parties: GEARY against CUNNINGHAM.
Judges: 
Reporter: Reports of cases adjudged in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania (Sergeant & Rawle)
Volume: 10
Pages: 230–231

Head Matter:
[Pittsburg,
September 22,1823.]
GEARY against CUNNINGHAM.
IN ERROR.
In account render between partners, an award of referees, appointed under the the act of 1705, of a sum of money to the plaintiffs, payable by instalments, is good.
Account Render was'brought in the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny county, by the defendant in error, Patrick Cunningham, against the plaintiff in error, Richard Geary, and the parties agreed to refer all matters in variance between them, (comprehending the whole of theirpartnershiptransactions and accounts,) to three persons, under the act of 1705, and that upon their report, or thatofa majority of them, the prothonotary should enter judgment which should be final and conclusive. The arbitrators awarded in favour of the plaintiff, Geary, the sum of 1018 dollars and 97 cents, and costs of suit, one-third of the said sum, with interest, to be paid in six months, one-third, with interest, in twelve months, and one-third, with interest, in twenty months from the date of the award. Judgment was rendered thereon, and was now removed by writ of error.
The plaintiff in error assigned for errors:
1. That the award was void, being payable by instalments.
2. The arbitrators have not made out and annexed to their report an account, resulting in the balance which they find for the plaintiff.
Biddle, for the plaintiff in error,
relied on the case of Shoemamaker v. Meyer, 4 Serg. Rawle, 452.
Baldwin, in the first place, objected to the writ of error, that there were no exceptions filed to this award in the court below, and also, that by the agreement of the parties that the report should be final and conlusive, the defendant below was precluded from taking out a writ of error. Then as to the error insisted on, that the debt was made payable by instalments, he relied on Bard’s Administrators v. Wilson, 3 Yeates, 149. The powers of referees under the act of 1705 are very extensive: they sit as a court of equity as well as law. They might order a partnership to be dissolved, or give other specific remedy.

Opinion:
The opinion of the court, (Tilghman, C. J. being absent,) was delivered by
Gibson, J.
An award of arbitrators who stand in the place of a jury, will be bad where a verdict would be bad; and a verdict for a debt or damages to be paid by instalments or in futuro, will not be sustained unless, perhaps, under particular equitable circumstances. Here however the action was not for a debt or for damages, but to have an account of a partnership, and therefore there is no room for an inference that the cause of action accrued after the commencement of the suit. Account render is at best a clumsy remedy and so greatly inferior to a bill in equity that it is, in England, abandoned altogether. Here it is often necessary to submit the whole matter to arbitrators who unquestionably have powers as extensive as those of a chancellor, and who may therefore make a special award in the nature of a decree, adapted to the particular circumstances of the case : and a decree in the terms of this award would undoubtedly be good. But I take the point to have been substantially, if not expressly, decided in Bard's Administrators, v. Wilson, 3 Yeates, 149. The exception to the award is therefore overruled.
Judgment affirmed.