Case Name: Alpheus G. Smith and Others v. Isaac C. Kendall
Court: Michigan Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Michigan
Decision Date: 1861-07-11
Citations: 9 Mich. 241
Docket Number: 
Parties: Alpheus G. Smith and Others v. Isaac C. Kendall.
Judges: Martin Ch. J., concurred.
Reporter: Michigan Reports
Volume: 9
Pages: 241–245

Head Matter:
Alpheus G. Smith and Others v. Isaac C. Kendall.
An instrument by which tho makers promise to pay to the order of the payees, at a time and place named, a specific sum of money with current exchange on New Yorlc, is a promissory note, and the endorsee may may bring suit upon it in his own name.
Heard May 1st.
Decided July 11th.
Error to Kent Circuit, where Kendall, describing himself as assignee of Henry C. Ely, Edward Brown and William II. McConnell, brought suit against Alpheus G. Smith, Daniel McConnell and William H. McConnell, on the common money counts, under which he recovered judgment upon the following instrument;
“$193.98. New York, July 13, 1858.
Eight months after date, we, the subscribers, of Grand Rapids, county of Kent, State of Michigan, promise to pay to the order of Ely, Brown & McConnell, seven hundred and ninety-three 98-100 dollars, at the Banking House of Duncan Sherman & Co., value received, with current exchange on New York.
(Signed,) Smith & McConnell.”
Endorsed by Ely, Brown & McConnell.
William H. McConnell, was a member of each of the firms named in the instrument.
J. T. Holmes, for plaintiffs in error,
insisted that this was not a promissory note, because not for a fixed and certain amount; — Story on Notes, §20; 2 Miles, 442; 10 Wend. 93; 13 Conn. 280; 6 Cow. 108; 2 Mich. 130. Also that the averment in the declaration that Kendall was assignee of Ely, Brown & McConnell, should have been, but was not, proved.
Withey & Gray, for defendant in error.

Opinion:
Manning J.:
The instrument for $793.98, it is argued, is not a promissory note, because it is payable with current exchange on New York. It calls for $793.98, if paid in the city of New York; if paid elsewhere it calls for that amount with such additional sum, called exchange, as will make the amount where paid equivalent to $793.98 in the city of New York.
A promisory note must be for the payment of a certain sum of money. Exchange varies from time to time, and might have been more or less when the $793.98 were to be paid than when the instrument was given. Is this fluctuation, to which exchange is subject, such a contingency or uncertainty as the rule requiring a note to be for a sum certain was intended to guard against? We think not. Bills of exchange and promissory notes are commercial instruments, and to facilitate commerce, are subject to certain rules of law not applicable to other contracts. These rules should be liberally construed, and in such a way as to effect the object had in view. Exchange is an incident to bills for the transmission of money from one place to another. Its nature and effect are well understood in the commercial world; and merchants having occasion to use ^heir funds at their place of business, sometimes make the currency at that point the standard of payments made to them by their customers at a different point. Such is the design of the instrument before us; and we believe such instruments are considered by commercial men to be promissory notes. In Pollard v. Herries, 3 B. & P. 335, P. deposited a sum of money with H. in Paris, and took H's note "payable in Paris, or at the choice of the bearer at the Union Bank in Dover, or at H's usual residence in London, according to the course of exchange upon Paris." This instrument was declared on as a promissory note, and spoken of and treated by both counsel and court as a promissory note. It is called a promissory note by the reporter, and treated as such by Mr. Chitty in his treatise on Bills of Exchange, pp. 232, 424. In Leggett v. Jones, 10 Wis. 34, a written promise to pay a sum of money "with exchange on New York," was held to be promissory note.
There is nothing in the other objection. The note was endorsed by Ely, Brown & McConnell, and every indorsee is the asignee of the endorser. The judgment must be affirmed with costs.
Martin Ch. J., concurred.