Court Opinion

ID: 9807809
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 20:16:14.177584+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:55:53.695265
License: Public Domain

Douglas, J.,
dissenting. From reason and authority it seems to me that the learned judge below was right in saying that when the purchaser has shown that he has paid a fair price for the goods, the burden then shifts, back to the plaintiff to show that the purchaser had knowledge of the fraudulent intent of the vendor. The mere fact that a fair price is paid is in itself the strongest evidence of good faith. It may be said that the vendee knows whether or not he knew of the vendor’s fraudulent intent, and that he can disprove suck knowledge by his own testimony. This is the only way such a negative can be proved; but is it any easier for the vendee to prove his want of knowledge than for the plaintiff to prove his knowledge. That the vendee had knowledge might be proved by one witness, but a thousand witnesses could not prove that he had no knowledge. All that they could prove would be that they did not give him any information to put him on notice and that he had no knowledge as far as they knew.
Suppose the vendee should die, ought the widow and orphan child to be deprived of the property, the full value of which had been honestly paid, on the unsupported admission of a self-confessed swindler that he had sold the property with the intent to thereafter fraudulently misapply the proceeds ? Who could swear of his own knowledge that the deceased vendee had no knowledge of such intent? Do we not effectually deprive a man of his right when we deprive him of all opportunity of asserting that right? It may be *743said again that “bard cases are the quicksands of the law”, but that celebrated expression of Chief Justice Pearson is no authority for creating quicksands. The few remaining hours of the term give me no time for the examination and citation of authorities, and so I must content myself with a single statement of my personal views.