Court Opinion

ID: 5462870
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-01-09 19:41:45.001413+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:32:58.366963
License: Public Domain

By the Court, Brady, J.
The defendants, Eckert & Winter, made their note to the order of the defendants, Altenbrand Brothers, for the accommodation of the latter, and it was passed to the plaintiffs in the course of business. The plaintiffs are brokers and bankers, and Altenbrand Brothers were in the habit of procuring from them discounts of regular business paper, delivering large amounts thereof at a time, and receiving advances upon or discounts of it, as the case might be. The defendant Altenbrand, who was examined as a witness, said: ‘ ‘ They would, as quick as the paper was disposed of or discounted, send me a statement at a certain rate.” The plaintiffs claimed to be the owners of the note in suit, and from the course of business adopted between them and Altenbrand Brothers, had evidently acquired it by discount, not by advance, although it would make no difference, unexplained, if at all, whether it was obtained by advancing money upon a usurious agreement or discounting it upon a similar understanding. The *61plaintiffs thus asserting the ownership of the paper, and it being without consideration between the original parties, it became important to the defence of usury interposed, to show at what rate the discount was made ; and hence the question, “Whatwas the discount,” which was objected to, and excluded, and exception taken. If the objection be held to be cured by the subsequent statement of the witness that the amount to be taken from the note, he thought, was 24 per cent, per annum, then the usurious rate was established. If it was not cured by reason of the indefinite character of that testimony, then the exception remains intact, and is fatal to the validity of the j udgment. It was an essential element of the defence that a greater sum than that allowed by law was agreed to be paid, and was received, and the question excluded was designed to elicit the proof. It seems, therefore, that taking either horn of the dilemma, the plaintiffs cannot maintain this judgment. It does not affect this view that the defendants did not request the presiding judge to submit any question to the jury. There was no necessity to make such a demand ; for assuming the proof to be that 24 per cent, per annum was paid for the discount, then the defence was made out; and if there was no proof, then the exception mentioned was well taken, and is controlling. The judgment, for these reasons, must be reversed and a new trial ordered, with costs to abide the event.
[First Department, General Term at New York,
November, 1873.
Hew trial ordered.
Ingraham and Brady Justices,]