Case Name: Ring and Rice v. Foster
Court: Supreme Court of Ohio
Jurisdiction: Ohio
Decision Date: 1834-12
Citations: 6 Ohio 540
Docket Number: 
Parties: Ring and Rice v. Foster.
Judges: Dissenting Opinion of Judge Wright.
Reporter: Cases decided in the supreme court of ohio : upon the circuit at the special sessions in Columbus
Volume: 6
Pages: 549–550

Head Matter:
Ring and Rice v. Foster.
Ante, 279.
Dissenting Opinion of Judge Wright.

Opinion:
Wright, J.:
The act of assembly dispenses with proof of execution of " any promissory note or bill of exchange " in a case situated as this is. 29 Ohio L. 122. The simple question before the court is, whether the following instrument is a promissory note, for no one claims it to be a bill of exchange:
"Three months after date we promise to pay Samuel Foster, or order, one hundred and forty-three dollars and twenty-two cents; provided Samuel Foster delivers the crop of tobacco raised by him and Trockmiller; the said Foster is to have one-fourth of the above in hand, and in addition three dollars and fifty cents per hundred for that part yet to be delivered, payable one-fourth in hand and the balance in one hundred and twenty days.
" Thomas H. Cushing,
Ring & Rice,
J. H. Harris, per J. JJ. Gushing.
" April 28, 1827."
A promissory notéis a "written promise for the payment of money, absolutely, and at all events." Bayley on Bills, 1. Accord* ing to Blackstone, 2 B. C. 467, it is " a plain and direct engagement in writing to pay a sum specified, at the time therein limited, to a person therein named, or sometimes to his order, or oftener to the bearer at large." To my understanding the instrument before me does not satisfy either definition, or the common acceptation of a promissory note. It is not an absolute promise to pay at all events a certain sum, for part of the amount is dependent upon the contingencies of the delivery of a crop of tobacco, and the quantity estimated at three dollars and fifty cents per hundred. The time of payment is not on a day fixed and certain, but depend-•541] ent the whole upon contingencies, and part upon ^double contingencies. If the crop of tobacco was delivered (at what time is uncertain), a fourth of the one hundred and forty-three dollars .and twenty-two cents was to be paid down, if not the whole in three months. If such an instrument was offered to a merchant, or a bank, as a promissory note, would it not be rejected at once .as no promissory note?
I think the court below erred in admitting the instrument in evidence without proof of its execution, because it is not a promissory note.