Court Opinion

ID: 86560
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2010-04-28 16:00:39+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:02:01.283431
License: Public Domain

50 U.S. 263 (1850)
9 How. 263
ANN BRABSTON, PLAINTIFF IN ERROR,
v.
TOBIAS GIBSON.
Supreme Court of United States.

*270 It was argued by Mr. Johnson (Attorney-General), for the plaintiff in error, and by Mr. Gilpin and Mr. Walker, for the defendant in error.
*276 Mr. Justice McLEAN delivered the opinion of the court.
This writ of error is brought to review a judgment of the Circuit Court for Louisiana.
The action was founded on two promissory notes given by Tobias Gibson, and dated the 24th of December, 1839, in which he promised to pay to William Harris, for value received, *277 at the "Agricultural Bank of the State of Mississippi," in one note, six thousand dollars, the 1st of February, 1845, and in the other, seven thousand dollars, the 1st of February, 1846. These notes were given in part consideration for a plantation and slaves in Louisiana, sold by William Harris to Gibson, to secure the payment of which and other notes a mortgage was executed on the property. The words "Ne varietur" were indorsed on the notes to identify them with the sale of the estate.
On the 21st of January, 1840, these notes were assigned, in the State of Mississippi, to the plaintiff, as collateral security for the payment of a note to her of the same date, given by Harris, who was a citizen of Mississippi, for six thousand dollars, payable twelve months after date. In the sale of the above property there was reserved to the vendor a right to repurchase it within ten years; and it appears there was a redemption of the property at the price for which it was sold, and a reconveyance to Harris was executed on the 18th of September, 1841. Two notes on Gibson were given up as a part of the consideration for the repurchase, but the above two notes for thirteen thousand dollars, having been assigned by Gibson to the plaintiff, were not surrendered, but Harris agreed that they should be given up and cancelled, and a mortgage was executed on the property to indemnify Gibson against them. The first mortgage for the consideration money was cancelled. Harris became bankrupt, and took the benefit of the bankrupt act in 1843.
The cause was submitted to the court on the facts agreed, and a judgment was rendered for the defendant. On several grounds, the plaintiff asks the reversal of this judgment.
The notes were given in Louisiana, but they were made payable and indorsed in Mississippi; consequently they are governed by the law of Mississippi. The law of the place where a contract is to be performed, and not the place where it was executed, applies. The indorsement of a note subjects the indorser to the obligations imposed by the law where the indorsement was made.
It is contended that, under the law of Mississippi, the defendant is not bound. The law referred to is in Howard and Hutchinson's Digest, 373, which declares that "all bonds, obligations, single bills, promissory notes, and all other writings for the payment of money or any other thing, shall and may be assigned by indorsement," &c., and the assignee may bring an action, &c., "and in all actions commenced or sued upon any such original bond, obligation, bill single, or promissory note, or other writing as aforesaid, the defendant shall be allowed the *278 benefit of all want of lawful consideration, failure of consideration, payments, discounts, and set-offs, made, had, or possessed against the same previous to notice of the assignment."
The only question in the case which can arise under this statute is, whether the admitted facts constitute a defence to the action. The facts not being within the statute cannot be set up as a defence under it. They do not show "an illegal consideration, a failure of consideration, payment, discount, or set-off." There was no pretence of payment of these notes in the redemption of the property. They were declared to remain in force, and to be subject to extinguishment when obtained. The case cited, of Parham v. Randolph, 4 How. Miss. 453, was where the note was given for land, the title to which failed; the failure of the consideration was held a good defence against the note in the hands of an assignee. That case was clearly within the statute.
These notes, being negotiable, were assigned to the plaintiff, for a valuable consideration, without notice, prior to the act of redemption. That act being a voluntary one by Harris, the assignor of the notes, it could in no respect prejudice the rights of his assignee. Under the laws of Louisiana, the right of redemption may be enforced against a purchaser of the thing liable to be redeemed, though that fact was not named in the second sale. And when a vendor recovers the possession of land, by virtue of the power of redemption, he takes it free of all encumbrances created by the purchaser.
But these principles can have no application to negotiable paper, though given for a thing purchased which the vendor may redeem. The purchaser who holds land or other property liable to be redeemed, reconveys the property only on the payment of the consideration money. And whether this payment be made by returns of the notes given, in money, or in some other manner acceptable to the parties, cannot be material. In the present case, it seems, Gibson was content to take a mortgage on the property reconveyed, to indemnify him against the outstanding notes.
From the fact that the notes were not given up, and an indemnity against him having been taken, a jury might well presume that Gibson had notice of the assignment. But this was not important to the right of the assignee. She stands unaffected by the reconveyance. The indorsement of the words "Ne varietur" could have no effect on the notes which were payable in Mississippi, and which were indorsed to the plaintiff in that State. Nor could they have affected the negotiable character of the notes, had they been assigned in the usual *279 course of business in Louisiana. Abat v. Gormley, 3 Louis. 241.
These notes were assigned to the plaintiff, as collateral security, by Harris, for the payment of his note for six thousand dollars, executed at the same time, which constituted a legal transfer of the notes, for the purpose stated. On the credit of these notes, it may be presumed, the plaintiff received the note of six thousand dollars from Harris.
If Gibson be considered as a guarantor, as contended, yet a notice was not necessary, as he received an ample indemnity against the six thousand dollars by the mortgage. But he was not a guarantor in any sense of that term. Harris assigned the notes as security, and, under the circumstances, he cannot complain of want of notice of his own default.
No demand of the notes, when due, at the Agricultural Bank of Mississippi, where they were made payable, was necessary. The action is against the maker of the notes, and if the money was in the bank, or if the party was there with the money to pay the notes on presentation, it is matter of defence, and consequently the demand at the bank need not be averred in the declaration, nor proved on the trial. This question was fully considered and decided in Wallace v. McConnell, 13 Peters, 136.
We think the judgment of the Circuit Court must be reversed, and the cause remanded to that court for further proceedings, conformably to this opinion.

Order.
This cause came on to be heard on the transcript of the record from the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Louisiana, and was argued by counsel. On consideration whereof, it is now here ordered and adjudged by this court, that the judgment of the said Circuit Court in this cause be, and the same is hereby, reversed, with costs, and that this cause be, and the same is hereby, remanded to the said Circuit Court for further proceedings to be had therein in conformity to the opinion of this court.