McClain v. Pittsburg Stock Exchange
McClain v. Pittsburg Stock Exchange
Opinion of the Court
Opinion by
E. D. Gartner and A. J. Harnack were copartners in the brokerage business, under the firm name of E. D. Gartner and Company, and having failed they made a voluntary assignment as individuals and copartners for the benefit of their creditors on January 23, 1906. The deed of assignment was duly recorded in the recorder’s office of Allegheny county. The assignee named in the deed declined to accept the trust. A successor was appointed by the court of common pleas, and he subsequently declined and was dismissed by the court. A bill in equity was filed by a creditor against the partnership and on May 10, 1906, Marshall McClain, appellant, was appointed receiver of Gartner and Harnack as individuals and as copartners doing business as E. D. Gartner and Company. Gartner was a member of the Pittsburg Stock Exchange, the appellee, and his seat was sold by the committee on membership for $5,000. The appellant filed this bill and therein prayed the court to enjoin the appellee, its officers and committees, from paying out the funds received from the sale of the seat in the Stock Exchange; that it be restrained from passing upon the validity of the claims against said fund ; and that it be directed to pay into court the money realized from the sale of the seat, to be disposed of as the court might direct.
The defendant, the appellee, demurred to the bill, and the demurrer was sustained by the court below.
The mere statement of the facts which are averred in the bill, as above stated, shows that the learned trial judge was right in sustaining the demurrer and in dismissing the bill. The assignment made by Gartner and Harnack as individuals
From what has been said it will appear that the court had no authority to appoint a receiver for Gartner’s property included in the deed of assignment. All the interest and estate
Fox v. Curtis, 176 Pa. 52, gives no support whatever to the appellant’s position in this case. In that case, each of the partners assigned the property on different dates to different assignees. There was no assignment by the partnership, and it was held in accordance with the decision in Sloan v. Moore, 37 Pa. 217, that one partner could not make a valid assignment of the partnership property; and that, under the peculiar circumstances of the case, the appointment of a receiver was the only adequate remedy by which the interests of all parties concerned in the partnership property could be preserved. In the case at bar, the two partners did not assign separately the partnership property, nor is it claimed that the assignment by Gartner of his seat in the Stock Exchange is invalid and did not pass the title to the assignee. On the contrary, it must be conceded that Gartner’s title to membership in the Stock Exchange passed by the assignment and was legally vested in the assignee. On the facts, therefore, of the case in hand, Fox v. Curtis, 176 Pa. 52, sustains the position of the appellee and therein it is said that “ if the assignment can be sustained as a general assignment the property assigned was vested in the trustee, and could not be taken from his control and placed in the hands of a receiver.”
The decree of the court below is affirmed.
Reference
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- Syllabus
- Assignment for creditors — Refusal of assignee to act — Title to property— Seat in stock exchange — Receiver—Act of June 14, 1836, P. L. 628. A deed of assignment for the benefit of creditors, duly recorded, vests in the assignee the title of the assignor, independent of the fact whether the assignee accepts or declines the trust. No trust will be permitted to fail or become noneffective by reason of the failure of the trustee to accept and perform the entries imposed by the trust. The deed of assignment conveys the property and creates the trust, and thereafter it is not in the power of the assignor or the assignee to defeat the trust. If the assignee renounces the trust, or refuses to act under or execute the same, sec. 23 of the Act of June 14, 1836, P. L. 628, provides that the court, shall appoint an assignee in his place. Where two copartners in a brokerage business make a voluntary assigriment as individuals and copartners for the benefit of their creditors, the title to a seat owned by them in a .stock exchange passes to the assignee, and a receiver subsequently appointed in an equity suit by a creditor against the partnership, can take no interest whatever in the .seat; and this is the case although the assignee named in the deed of assignment and a person appointed in his stead by the court, both refuse to accept the trust. In such a case the trust will not fail for want of a trustee.