Court Opinion

ID: 9829012
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 18:55:36.668244+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:56.429353
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
It is clear that under the authority of Berry v. McAdams, supra, neither tbe Iron Company nor the Glass Company ever acquired any liens enforceable against the property of Crowdus which is involved in this suit. In that case McAdams, who had furnished material to the contractor, sought to enforce a lien against the property of the owner. The court expressly decided that the validity of his lien against the property depended upon a compliance with the requirements of the statutes enacted in pursuance of the Constitution. Upon this phase of the case the court says: “Erom the statement it appears that McAdams did not give written notice of his claim for material furnished to Housewright, Swasey & Co. (the owners) before they had paid to Berry (the contractor) the amount due him under the contract for building the house; and by the terms of article' 8308, Revised Statutes, Housewright, Swasey & Co. were not liable to McAdams for the material furnished to the subcontractor.” The court then quotes the constitutional and statutory provisions giving to materialmen the lien claimed, after which he continues: “The practical effect of article 3296, in connection with the article last quoted, is to garnish so much of the sum due from the owner of the building as may be necessary to pay for material furnished. But for the protection of the owner he and his property are exempted from liability for such claim, unless written notice be given before he pays the contractor. * * * Appellee insists that the notice required by the statute is for the benefit of the owner of the property improved, and that actual knowledge by Housewright, Swasey & Co. was a sufficient compliance with the law. The language ‘but no owner or proprietor shall in any case be required to pay, nor his property be liable for any money that he may have paid to the contractor before the fixing of the lien or before he had received writen notice of the existence of tbe debt,’ is so explicit that the court cannot construe it to mean something less. The policy of the law is to relieve the owner from demands upon the ground of actual knowledge and constructive notice, because he could rarely defend himself from such claims. Written notice is certain and definite information upon which the owner must act. McAdams did not fix his lien nor give the written notice before payment was made by Housewright, Swasey & Co. to B'erry, the contractor; and is not entitled to enforce a lien upon their property for material furnished to a subcontractor.” As stated in the original opinion, the facts disclosed by the record in this case show that no written notice was ever given to the owner, Crowd-us, by either the Iron Company or the Glass Company, as required by the provisions of the statute; hence, under the above authority, no liens that could be enforced against the property of Crowdus were fixed by either of those creditors.
[6] But it is insisted that this suit is not an effort to recover a judgment against the owner or enforce a lien against his property, but is only a contest between claimants of a fund found to be due on the contract price and which is still in the hands of the owner. It is true that Crowdus by agreement was permitted to pay into court the balance ascertained to be due upon the contract price. This fund by that agreement was substituted for Crowdus. In order to be entitled, to a participation in its distribution, the claimant must have had a valid lien that would entitle him to proceed against the property of Crowdus. Before either the Iron Company or the Glass Company can assert any right to any portion of this fund, they must first establish a claim-enforceable against the property. It is only by virtue of such liens that they can have recourse to any portion of this balance due upon the contract price.
We are referred to several cases as holding that a contractor cannot assign the sum due him so as to defeat the claims of mate-rialmen. An examination of those authorities shows that the facts there under consideration were radically different from those involved in this case, and that the rule there announced does not support the proposition here asserted. The Lumber Company at the time it took the assignment was a creditor of Turner for material which it had furnished for the construction of the Crowdus building, and was as much entitled to fix a lien against the property as any of the other materialmen. At the time it took from Turner this assignment of the balance due on the contract price Turner owed it, for material furnished, more than the amount which passed by his order. When this order which accompanied the assignment was accepted by the owner, he thereafter became bound to pay that amount of money to the Lumber Company. Crowdus had the right to pay that sum to the Lumber Company immediately upon the presentation of the order. Had this been done, there would not have remained in the hands of Crowdus any balance of the contract price to become due. If instead of making this payment in cash Crowdus accepted the order and made himself the personal debtor of the Lumber Company instead of a debtor to Turner, why should he not be held to have discharged his obligation to Turner as effectually as if he had paid the Lumber Company that much money? Efforts thereafter to establish liens *625against the property would be as ineffectual as if the debt had been discharged in cash instead of by this system of novation.
The motion for rehearing is overruled.