Court Opinion

ID: 7188805
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-24 16:54:57.166213+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:16:08.251656
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing.
Howell, J.
On a rehearing of this case, we deem it better to present the main question in the following form: Do the facts that the. accounts were opened and kept in the name of the succession of Neal Davidson, and the notes given in settlement thereof, signed by the defendant as administratrix, preclude plaintiffs from holding the. defendant individually liable?
As before said, we think the jurisprudence of this State maintains-the negative. See 5 N. S. 530; 8 N. S. 451; 2 La. 188; 1 R. 119; 9 R. 276; 12 R. 16; 8 An. 432 : 9 An. 130; 21 An. 286; 22 An. 293, 371.
When the account was opened, the defendant had not been appointed (nor any one else) to administer, and hence had no authority to represent or bind the succession, and her subsequent appointment, even if. *431it liad been regular, could not make the debt one against the succession, and the error of plaintiffs as to her capacity or authority had no such effect. The mistake of defendant’s counsel is in supposing that credit could, under the circumstances, have been given to the succession. The account and the notes, are only evidence in different forms, of the extent of an obligation, and if the defendant could not create the obligation on the part ot the succession, her consent that the account should be made in the name of the succession and to give the notes as administratrix, could have no such effect, and having so dealt with plaintiffs without legal authority, she rendered herself personally liable for the supplies furnished by them and received and used by her.
It is therefore ordered that our judgment remain undisturbed.
Mr. Justice Wyly dissents, for reasons to be filed.