Court Opinion

ID: 8635774
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-11-24 19:44:59.443972+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:55:55.287038
License: Public Domain

TANEY, Circuit Justice.
The libel is filed in this case in order to charge the brig Camilla with the sum of $1,197.08, the amount due libellants for copper sold by them, and applied to the use of the brig. The Camilla belonged to the port of Boston, and was owned by Theodore D. Parker, of the state of Massachusetts. The brig being in the port of New York in the month of September, 1836, and requiring new copper to make her seaworthy, the master applied to Smith & Town, merchants of New York, who were the agents and consignees of the brig, to procure the necessary supply; the copper was bought from the libellants, on a credit of six months, in the following manner: Smith & Town gave their written order on the libellants for the copper, which order was sent to them by one of the clerks of Smith & Town; the order for the copper did not mention the brig Camilla or her owners, and was simply an order from Smith & Town. Upon this order, the copper was furnished by the libellants, and charged in their books to Smith & Town, and no reference whatever was made in the entry to the brig or her owners; and the libellants afterwards presented their account to Smith & Town, for the amount, and took their negotiable note, payable in six months.
The account originally presented by them has been produced, and is headed ’ as follows: “New York, September 30, 1836. Messrs. Smith & Town, bought of Phelps, Dodge & Co.”
The note given by Smith & Town does not purport to be made by them as agents, but is their own personal engagement to pay the money, and is in ordinary form of a negotiable note; and in their accounts with Theodore D. Parker in their books,. they charged the amount of the note, deducting three per cent, from it, against the brig Camilla. The three per cent, was deducted in order to make the transaction a cash one, as between the owner and consignees. '
The brig, on the 16th of October, 1836, after these repairs were made, sailed for Rio de Janeiro; from which place she returned to New York, about the 1st of March, 1837; remained there about twenty days; then sailed for Baltimore, where she was found when *444the process in this case -was served upon her. Parker, the owner of the vessel, stopped payment in March, 1837, and on the 20th of that month, executed a deed to a trustee, conveying all his property for the benefit of his creditors. Smith & Town stopped payment about the 1st of April, 1S37, and within a day or two of the time when the note for the copper fell due, they informed the libellants that they would not be able to take up the note, and that the vessel, for which the copper was furnished, was then lying at the port of Baltimore; the libellants thereupon instituted these proceedings against the vessel, and the monition was served on the 22d of April, 1837.
These are the material facts in the case. It is true, that Nathaniel E. James, the clerk of Phelps, Dodge & Co., states that the entry above mentioned, in the books of the libel-lants, was made by him in the hurry of business, and the copper, by mistake, charged to Smith & Town, instead of “the brig Camilla and owners, per Smith & Town”; and that when the error was detected, which was several months afterwards, the entry was corrected. But the court think that the charge against Smith & Town is not accounted for, by the statement of the witness, that it was made in the hurry of business; for the account afterwards rendered to them, charged the copper in the same manner. The personal engagement of Smith & Town was also taken for the payment of the money in six months; and Phelps, Dodge & Co. not only received this note, but afterwards negotiated it, or intended to negotiate it, as appears by their endorsement upon it, which has since been cancelled. These acts of the libellants, taken together, can hardly be reconciled with the notion, that Smith & Town were erroneously charged with the copper, by a mistake of the clerk, in the hurry of business. If the copper had been charged to the “brig and her owners,” per Smith & Town, they would not have been personally responsible to Phelps, Dodge & Co.; yet all the acts of the parties are perfectly consistent with their personal responsibility, according to the charge in the original entry, and inconsistent with the one subsequently made; for Smith & Town, after having given their note to Phelps, Dodge & Co., at six months, proceed to charge against the owner the cash price of the copper, as if the amount had been settled with the libellants by them; besides, the vague manner in which the witness states the time when the error was discovered, and the omission to mention what circumstance led to the discovery, leave no doubt (when the testimony of this witness is compared with that of Smyth Clark) that this alleged error was never discovered, and the alteration in the libellants’ books never made, until they were informed by Smith & Town that they were about to stop payment. An alteration made in the books of the libellants, under such circumstances, cannot be allowed to affect, in any degree, the decision of the con-troversv now before the court.
It is admitted in the argument, that the lien given by the statute of New York cannot affect this case, and the question to be decided is, whether the debt due to Phelps, Dodge & Co., for this copper, is, by the general maritime law, a lien on the brig.
Prima facie, the necessary repairs furnished by material men to a foreign ship. are. without doubt, a lien on the vessel. The Camilla was a foreign vessel in the port of New York, so far as this question is concerned; the copper, it appears, was necessary, and the credit of six months would not prevent the lien from attaching. But all the authorities on the subject agree that, if the respondents show that the credit was given to the owner or any one else, and not to the vessel, then there is no lien; and I think it evident, from the testimony in this cause, it was furnished on the personal credit of Smith & Town.
In the case of The St. Jago de Cuba, 9 Wheat. [22 U. S.] 417, the supreme court decided that, if the vessel was in the port of a state to which she did not belong, yet, if the owner was present, and the contract made personally with him, it would be presumed to be made on his personal credit, and there would be no lien on the vessel, unless it was specially given. Can there be any difference in principie, where the owner has an agent residing at the place, who purchases the materials in his own name, and gives his personal undertaking to pay the price? I think not. If the circumstance that' the contract was made with an owner transiently present at the port, would repel the legal presumption that the credit was given to the vessel, it would seem to follow, that the same rule must govern, where the contract was made by the consignee and agent of the owner, and he became personally responsible to the party furnishing the materials. In either of these cases, the transaction becomes an ordinary one between buyer and seller, and although the materials are afterwards applied to the use of the vessel, that circumstance will not make them a lien upon her; they must be supplied for her and upon her credit, in order to create the lien.
In the case before the court, they were, in truth, furnished to the vessel by Smith & Town. Phelps, Dodge & Co. sold the copper to Smith & Town, upon their personal credit, and Smith & Town furnished it to the brig; this is obviously the real history of this transaction, and Phelps, Dodge & Co., therefore, never had a lien upon the brig for the price of this copper.
There are strong reasons for believing that Smith & Town had funds of the owner of the Camilla in their hands, at the time this copper was purchased; for they would otherwise hardly have given their note for it, at six months, at the credit price, and charged it against the owner, at the cash price, deduct*445ing in their charge three per cent, from the amount for which they gave their note. And if they had funds in their hands, it would readily account for the manner in which they procured the copper, and would show the reason for purchasing it in their own names, and upon their own responsibility, instead of procuring it as agents merely, and upon the credit of the brig and her owner.
But I do not put the decision upon this ground, for if the issue of the controversy depended on this fact, I should have thought it incumbent on the respondents to establish it by more satisfactory proof, than the inference to be drawn from the circumstance I have mentioned. I do not, therefore, place the decision upon the ground that Smith & Town had funds in their hands sufficient to purchase the copper, but upon the ground, that the whole evidence shows, that it was sold to them by Phelps, Dodge & Co., upon their personal credit, and was not furnished on the credit of the brig and her owner; and that the first entry in the books of .the libellants, gives the true account of the transaction.
It must not, however, be understood, that the decision would be different, if the copper had been originally charged to the Camilla and her owners. It is true, that upon such a sale, the libellants would, in the first instance, have acquired a lien upon the brig; but that lien, in my opinion, would have been waived by taking afterwards the note of Smith & Town. This is the doctrine recognised in The Nestor [Case No. 10,126], and in the case of Murray v. Lazarus [Id. 9,962], where the material men had agreed with the master to take a bill of exchange on the agents of the owners, the court held that it was a waiver of the lien.
In the last-mentioned case, the court say: “If this is to be considered a regular and ordinary bill of exchange, it was a satisfaction for any lien that might have existed, and must be considered as a relinquishment thereof.” The same may be said of the note given by Smith & Town in this case, even if the account in the books of Phelps, Dodge & Co. is corrected in the manner stated in the testimony of James. If the party does not choose to rely on the contract which the maritime law implies in such cases, but takes an express written contract, he must rely on the contract he makes for himself, and cannot, upon a change of circumstances, resort to the securities upon which, in the absence of any special agreement, the law presumes that he relied; and if he takes a note or bill of exchange, or any other personal engagement, for the payment of the debt, he is presumed to rely on this personal security, and to waive his lien, unless he stipulates that the liability of the vessel shall still continue.
In either view, therefore, of the facts stated in the testimony, there is no lien on the Camilla, for the copper furnished by the libel-lants, and the decree of the district court dismissing the libel must, therefore, be affirmed.
I have said nothing of the deed made by Theodore D. Parker for the benefit of his creditors, because I do not think that the deed affects the merits of this controversy; and upon the principle adopted by the court, the decision must have been the same, even if Parker had remained solvent, and was still the owner of the brig. Decree affirmed, with costs.