Court Opinion

ID: 9550251
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:32:52.073234+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:19:46.126211
License: Public Domain

Fontron, J.,
concurring: I am compelled to concur in the affirmance of this judgment, although I do so with great reluctance because of the bald scheme which plaintiff devised to mulct his own credit union and the fellow employees who accommodated him by going on his note. I base my concurrence, however, on the ground that plaintiff is barred under the doctrine of res judicata, not, as *423held by the court, that separation pay which is payable on a future contingency constitutes future wages.
As I see the situation existing at the time Commodore chose to take bankruptcy, separation pay which Commodore might collect in the future, was not the equivalent of wages which Commodore might earn in the future. Neither of tire two federal cases cited in the majority opinion, Local Loan Co. v. Hunt, 292 U. S. 234, 78 L. Ed. 1230, 54 S. Ct. 695, 93 A. L. R. 195, and In re West, 128 Fed. 205, sustains the view adopted by my colleagues that an assignment of separation pay is tantamount to an assignment of future wages.
In each of those cases the assignment which was the subject of the action, related to wages to.be earned in the future, not to accumulated separation pay. Furthermore, the wages sought to be taken or attached in those two actions were earned entirely after the assignors had been adjudicated bankrupts.
Frankly, I believe it tortures the English language far too much to equate separation pay, entitlement to which is contingent upon the happening of a future event, with wages which are to be earned in the future. A scarcity of time precludes discussion in greater depth.