Union & Planters' Bank v. Allen
Union & Planters' Bank v. Allen
Opinion of the Court
delivered the opinion of the court.
We granted at the last term a reargument, and have given the case a careful and critical re-examination. One of the learned counsel for appellee states that if it were the fact that the assignment itself did not convey land, then the former decision was correct. We fail to see that it was material, as to this point, ivhether the assignment contained only personalty, and the aiding deeds only land, or whether the assignment contained both. It is clear that the assignment and the aiding deeds of November 25, 1890, all constituted, in law, one transaction, and are, in effect, one instrument, and, this being so, it is plainly immaterial whether land was conveyed by one instrument and the personalty by another, or both were conveyed by one. 'NTh© assignment and the aiding deeds are, in law, on© instrument] and that instrument an assignment, and not a trust deed or mortgage.
Another learned counsel for appellant puts his contention upon the ground that the former decision in 72 Miss., 549, was a square decision; that the composition agreement of December 20, 1890, revoked the assignment in bobo as to both realty and personalty, and is res adjudicaba of this point. This is a palpable misconception of said decision. In that case we were combating the then contention of appellant that the assignment proper, and the aiding deeds, both constituting, as stated, the assignment, were one and the same instrument with the composition agreement, evidencing an identical transaction. For the purpose of exposing the fallacy of that contention, we said arguendo, that “so far from the composition agreement effecting the same result with that sought to be accomplished by the assignmenfand deeds in aid of it, as they were originally framed; its purpose, the purpose of the composition agreement, was just the opposite, to revoke and annul it.” The exact point, and the only point, decided was that the nonassent-ing creditors, one-tenth in number, were necessary parties.
Still another contention most earnestly pressed now, as it was before, is that the composition agreement revoked the assignment and aiding deeds as to both personalty and realty, leaving the rights of the firm creditors provided for therein, to stand or fall by the composition agreement, and what was done under it; or, that in any case, the assignment and aiding deeds must be treated as modified by the composition agreement, and thus changed from their purpose as originally framed to the purpose declared by said composition agreement. What Avas done by the assignors, the assignee, and the creditors, under and in pursuance of the composition agreement, did revoke the assignment as to the personalty. Although the assignee did not sign the composition agreement, he did redeliver, as it provided, all the assigned personalty to the assignors.
Was the assignment revoked as to the realty? The assignment and aiding deeds had been duly executed and delivered, the trust thereby created had been, by the assignee, accepted, and its discharge entered upon. The legal title to the lands was out of the grantors, and in the assignee. No reconveyance was made by him. The declaration is expressly made by the assignors, in the composition agreement, that they had been advised that the arrangement manifested by ■ it could be made effectual legally, so as to restore to them the personalty, but not the realty. That instrument further expressly declares, on its face, that “the deed of trust on the lands conveyed to the trustee by the deed of November 25, '1890, shall remain until the notes, Avith interest, are
But it is insisted that the composition modified the assignment so as to reserve to the assignors power to sell or mortgage the lands, and that such power, coupled with an interest or not, avoids the assignment. It is, of course, elementary learning that one making a general assignment for the benefit pf his creditors, must, in good faith, de.vo-te the whole of his nonexempt property to the payment of his debts, parting absolutely with all control over the same, and must reserve no benefit to himself, and retain no power or control over the property. And unlike- a mortgage, no equity of redemption exists under such an instrument. Burrill on Assignments, secs. 6, 7. What is the clause here on which this agreement is based? This, “except that we, the grantors, through the trustee, shall have the power to sell or mortgage the lands, plantations, and city property (where the laws of states 'in which said land, etc., are situated, do not forbid such disposition of the property) which was conveyed to the trustee, the -proceeds in all cases to be applied exclusively to the payment of the notes.”
Regard must be had to the nature and condition of the property, and to tire whole environment. Bump on Fraudulent Conveyances, pp. 401, 402. It must also be noted that the power of anticipating the maturity of these notes, paying them sooner and arresting interest, was expressly reserved, and that undoubtedly the assignee was bound, even under the composition agreement, to sell to meet each series of notes, at the respective maturities, if not then respectively paid. Clearly, therefore, there was no extension for two years as to the whole indebtedness, but extension for six, twelve, eighteen, and twenty-four months respectively. At furthest there was an extension of time for two years of only the last series of notes. We do not think this extension unreasonable in the circumstances of this case. Barkwell v. Swan, 69 Miss., 907; Bennett v. Bank, 5 Hum. (Tenn.), 612.
We have considered all the cases cited by appellant. Perhaps the two most relied on are Guggenheimer v. Groeschel, 23 S. C., 274, and Spence v. Bagwell, 6 Grattan, 444, 450. In the first named case the creditors and assignee, to whom there had been delivery of all the goods assigned, reconveyed all the goods to the assignor, and the whole arrangement as originally framed was purposely vacated. It is thus wholly unlike this case on its facts. In the second case the grantor himself was to give title “to the property to be sold, and himself to collect the proceeds of sale,” a wholly different provision from the one before us as we understand and construe it.
But again it is said that the provision for the payment of the debts of the house of R. H. Allen & Co., of New York, introduced a new class of debts and a new creditor. This is a plain misconception of the record, as the pleadings and exhibits
Finally, it is insisted now for the first time, after the judgment of this court on the second appeal, in the reargument now made, that the composition agreement of December 20, 1890, is a mortgage, and that there was no sufficient declaration of the new trusts under our statute of frauds, and, that even if there were such sufficient declaration of trust, it was not set out in any instrument recorded in Mississippi of which appellant had notice.
Now, the whole gist of the amended bill, which is the real initiation of this present controversy, was the claim that the assignment and composition agreement were one instrument evidencing an identical transaction, and were fraudulent and void, so taken and dealt with as one. That contention was shown to be unsound in 72 Miss., 549. The second amended bill is framed on, and presents, the idea that even if the assignment, which included the aiding deeds, was valid as originally framed, yet it was wholly revoked, as to both realty and personalty, by the composition agreement.
This, our opinion on this appeal, now adhered to after the
AVe do not desire to cut off the appellant, however, from relief, if any it has, along this last line of assault upon these instruments, and our judgment of affirmance in this ease^ therefore, is now pronounced without prejudice to such rights of appellant, if any, along that line, ás it may choose to assert in an original bill. We have given this case a most patient hearing; we find no fraudulent act, nothing that hints at fraud, in the facts set out by the bill. On the contrary, the purpose of the Allens was to devote their property honestly to the payment of their debts, so far as anything averred in the bill, twice amended, discloses.
Affirmed.
Reference
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- Union & Planters' Bank v. Thomas H. Allen
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- 1. Assignments fob Cbbditoes. Aiding deeds. Where an assignment for the benefit of creditors and deeds executed in aid of it are in contemplation of law but one instrument, it is immaterial whether the assignment conveyed only personalty, the aiding deeds alone conveying the land, or whether the assignment conveyed both species of property. 2. Same. Composition. Revocation. Where an assignee in an assignment for the benefit of creditors has been invested with the legal title to lands and personalty and afterwards, in pursuance of a composition agreement made between the assignors and their creditors, surrenders possession of and delivers up the personalty, retaining title to the land, the assignment is revoked as to the personalty but not as to the lands, if the composition agreement expressly provides that the assignee shall retain title to the latter until the payment of notes given for the debts sought to be secured. 3. Same. Assignor as agent of assignee. If an assignment executed by the members of a co-partnership for the benefit of co-partnership creditors be so modified by a composition agreement between the assignors and their creditors as no constitute the assignors (who are thoroughly familiar with the lands conveyed and their environments and capable and efficient to perform the service) the agents of the assignee to negotiate sales of the lands, power being reserved in the assignee to consummate or reject such proposed sales, this does not render the assignment void as to a creditor of one of the partners. 4. Same. Extension of time to perform trust. An extension of time to an assignee in an assignment for the benefit of co-partnership creditors in which to perform his trust, if made by a composition agreement between the assignors and their co-partnership creditors, does not, where the extension is reasqnable, necessary and incidental to a proper discharge of the trust, render the assignment-void as to a creditor of one of the partners. And if the circumstances are unusual an extension of two years on a part of the debt is not necessarily unreasonable. 5. ^Equity Pbocedube. New contention. If a suit in equity by a creditor of one of several partners be prosecuted wholly on the idea that an assignment for the benefit of co-partnership creditors and deeds in aid of it are fraudulent and void until adjudged valid by the supreme court upon a first appeal, and when remanded to the court of original jurisdiction is then prosecuted wholly on the idea that the deeds were revoked by composition articles between the assignors and the co-partnership creditors until this contention is denied by the supreme court on a second appeal, the complainant will not be allowed, on a reargument of the second appeal, to change the base of his contentions and insist, outside of his pleadings and the scope of the prayer of his bill, that the composition agreement constituted a mortgage, and as such is void under the registry laws. 6. Same. Supreme court practice. In such case the new claim of the complainant may be made the basis of an original suit; and the,supreme court will, the claim not being manifestly without merit, so frame its decree of af-firmance as to prevent embarrassment in its prosecution. 7. Allen v. Union Bank, 72 Miss., 549. The former decision of this case (72 Miss., 549) did not adjudge that the composition agreement revoked the assignment in toto.