Court Opinion

ID: 9550855
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:43:40.197975+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:22:34.400570
License: Public Domain

OPALA, Justice,
concurring in result:
Livestock, having received credit from the Bank [McDonald County Bank] for the $13,288.52 settlement payment of Maxson, brought this action to recover from Maxson $16,002.34 — the unpaid balance on Maxson’s $29,290.86 check to Paul Durbin [Durbin]. Livestock- claims to be a holder in due course of that check which, it alleges, was “endorsed and delivered” to it “for value” when Durbin’s wife, Donna, deposited the check in the Bank, along with another for $9,262.43, with her signed instruction to credit Livestock’s account for $38,145.06. The check, when deposited, bore Paul Dur-bin’s blank endorsement on its reverse side.
At least three (3) theories might be advanced to explain the legal effect Donna’s signed instruction had on Livestock’s status vis-a-vis the Bank: (a) the deposit slip became, in the Bank’s hands, an allonge to Maxson’s check, as defined by § 3-202(2),1 bearing Donna’s special endorsement to Livestock, within the meaning of § 3-204(1), and so transferring the instrument by negotiation and delivery; (b) the deposit slip is not a part of the check as an allonge and operates merely as a common-law assignment of proceeds from collection of two checks; or (c) since the aggregate amount Donna asked to be credited to Livestock’s account [$38,145.06] exceeded the stated sum of either of the two checks she deposited [Maxson’s $29,290.86 and another for $9,262.43] but was less than the total of both of them, Donna’s signed instruction must be considered in law as an attempt to transfer “less than the entire instrument” in either check so as to operate as “partial assignment” of both checks within the meaning of § 3-202(3).
We need not pause here to consider, must less decide, any of these issues which could *708be more appropriately litigated in an action by Livestock against Durbin or the Bank. Some, if not all of these issues, might even be governed by the law of Missouri where the Durbin deposit was made. Since the pertinent U.C.C. provisions likely to be invoked are susceptible of different interpretation, we should be loath here to prejudge the matter, because in this lawsuit the rights of Livestock vis-a-vis Maxson, the only parties before us, may be easily decided without settling Livestock’s status as holder in due course of Maxson’s check for $29,290.86.
The dispositive issue before us, somewhat eclipsed by the advocates’ rhetoric, is whether Maxson’s $13,288.52 payment to the Bank in settlement of his liability on the $29,290.86 check in suit operates as an effective in toto discharge of the instrument and bars Livestock’s action.
When, on receiving Maxson’s $13,288.52 2 payment, the Bank delivered to him the check in suit, it was a bearer instrument. It bore but one blank endorsement of Paul Durbin, the payee.3 Nowhere on the instrument was there Livestock’s endorsement. From the four corners of the check there could be no doubt but that the Bank had authority to effect a discharge of the instrument either as Durbin’s agent for collection4 or as its possible holder in due course.5 The face of the instrument did not reveal any interest or equity in it was held by Livestock. The proof does not disclose Maxson had notice aliunde6 of Livestock’s claim. If ever owner or holder in due course of the check in suit, Livestock was to Maxson, at the very best, but an undisclosed principal of the Bank.7 Indeed, there is evidence in the record from which we may find that in effecting a settlement with Maxson the Bank was also acting, with Livestock’s consent, as its agent for collection. The agency relation would, of course, make Livestock bound by the Bank’s discharge, whether that stood disclosed or was unknown to Maxson.
As I view this lawsuit, Maxson’s settlement with the Bank, as apparent agent for Durbin, the ostensible owner of the check [and Maxson’s obligor on the other $16,-002.34 check] was a transaction inter partes in which Maxson’s set-off defense was available.8 Even if, as between Durbin and Livestock, Livestock were the owner of the instrument — a question we need not address here — 9 the Bank as ostensible prima facie agent for either or both could and did effect a binding settlement which operates to discharge Maxson’s entire liability on the instrument.10 It simply makes no difference here whether the Bank’s possession of *709the check was as Durbin’s or Livestock’s agent.11
Livestock’s claim the discharge operated pro tanto [to the extent of the $13,288.52 payment by Maxson] is untenable. This is so because as the Bank’s disclosed or undisclosed principal for collection Livestock cannot now qualify, under the provisions of § 3-603(1), as “another person ” whose right to collect the balance of the instrument may stand preserved.12
Maxson ⅛ check in suit had been discharged before this action was brought. No recovery can be had here against Max-son regardless of Livestock’s status vis-a-vis Durbin or the Bank. The result reached by the court is correct, but its reasons are substantially different from mine.
I am authorized to state that IRWIN, V. C. J., concurs in these views.

. All citations in the text and footnotes, unless indicated otherwise, are to 12A O.S. 1971.

. The amount of the payment represents the difference between Maxson’s $29,290.86 check to Durbin, which is here in suit, and Durbin’s $16,002.34 check to Maxson [previously returned to Maxson because of insufficient funds].

. § 3-204(2).

. § 4-201.

. A bank that gives credit available for withdrawal acquires a security interest in an item and may claim in it the status of a holder in due course. §§ 4-208 and 4-209. But not so if the bank collecting for payee knows of maker’s defense. Oklahoma National Bank v. Equitable Credit Finance Co., Okl., 489 P.2d 1331 (1971).

. The nature of notice is defined by U.C.C., §§ 1-201(25) and 3-304.

. There is no proof here that Donna’s deposit slip (instructing the Bank to credit Livestock’s account for $38,145.06) was in fact attached as an allonge to the check when it was presented to Maxson for payment. Absent some physical attachment, the credit slip could not operate, as to Maxson, as an allonge. See Estrada v. River Oaks Bank & Trust Co., 550 S.W.2d 719, 725 (Tex.Civ.App.1977); West Point Wholesale Grocery Company v. Bulls, 44 Ala.App. 573, 217 So.2d 83, 85 (1968); Anno. 19 A.L.R.3d 1297, 1299.

. § 3-302(l)(c); Brotherton v. McWaters, Okl., 438 P.2d 1 (1968). The terms of § 3-301 plainly authorize any holder to discharge an instrument upon payment, whether holder in due course or not.

. § 4-201.

. §§ 3-301 and 3-601(2).

. Possession alone does not make one holder in due course. The possession must also meet the transfer by negotiation requirements of § 3-202. See Estrada v. River Oaks Bank and Trust Co., supra note 7, at p. 724. If the Bank had possession of Maxson’s check as Livestock’s rather than Durbin’s agent, Livestock would satisfy the possession requirement of § 1-201(20) but not necessarily the transfer by negotiation test of § 3-202 because Donna’s credit slip might be no more than a common-law partial assignment or assignment of collection proceeds.

. So far as the record informs us, Livestock is a stranger to the instrument who did not make its claim known to Maxson before discharge was effected. § 3-603(1). Livestock knew of the Bank’s settlement with Maxson and agreed to “stand the loss” of the uncollected difference of $16,002.34, in the sense that credit for that amount was allowed to be withdrawn from its account.