Cordier v. Schloss
Before: Baldwin, Tebby
Synopsis
Appeal from the Fourth District, County of San Francisco.
This action in the Court below was Ernest Cordier v. M. Schloss, Joseph Heilbroner, Joseph S. Kohn, Morris Kohn and David Scannell.
At the date of the transactions in the case, the defendants, M. Schloss and Joseph Heilbroner (who are the only appellants), were merchants in New York, residing there and doing business under the name of Schloss & Heilbroner. The other defendants, Joseph S. Kohn and Morris Kohn, were dealers in San Francisco or Sacramento, under the name of Joseph S. Kohn & Brother, and insolvent. The remaining defendant, David Seannell, was Sheriff of the County of San Francisco.
On February 18th, 1857, a judgment by confession for $2,616, with $13.75 costs, in favor of the defendants, Schloss & Heilbroner, against the defendants, Joseph S. and Morris Kohn, was entered up in the District Court of the Fourth Judicial District.
The statement on which the judgment was entered is as follows :
Statement.
“ The defendants state and admit that they are justly indebted to the plaintiffs in the sum of two thousand and four hundred dollars, and interest thereon at the rate of one per cent, per month, from the fifteenth day of May, 1856, for which amount they consent that judgment may be entered against them by the Clerk of said District Court, in his office; and the facts out of which said indebtedness accrued, are as follows, to wit: That the plaintiffs are the owners of the'following promissory note, made by said defendants, to wit:
“ ‘ Sacramento, May 15th, 1859.
“ ‘ $2,400.
“ ‘ Eight months after date we promise to pay to the order of ourselves, in the City of New York, two thousand and four hundred dollors, at the rate of one per cent. (1 pr. ct.) per month until paid, value received.
“ ‘ (Signed) JOSEPH S. KOHN & RRO.’
“ That the said note was given by the said defendants to the said plaintiffs for goods sold and delivered to the defendants by the firm of Schloss & Heilbroner, the plaintiffs aforesaid, and money had and received by defendants; that the consideration for said promissory note was said money and goods, sold by plaintiffs to, and received by them, the defendants aforesaid.
“ That the sum above by us confessed, is justly due to the said plaintiffs, on the foregoing note, after allowing all just credits and offsets, without any fraud whatever, for which amount they do hereby authorize the Clerk of said Court to enter up judgment against them, the said defendants.”
Dated, Sah Francisco,
the day of February, 1857.
Tebby, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court—Baldwin, J., concurring in a separate opinion.
This is a proceeding to set aside a confession of judgment made by Kohn & Co. in favor of Schloss & Heilbroner.
The allegations of fraud in the complaint are sufficiently controverted by the answer; and the evidence shows that the amount for which judgment was confessed was actually due Schloss & Heilbroner by Kohn & Co.
The case is entirely analogous to that of Richards v. McMillan et al, (6 [147]Cal. 418) and as we see no reason to question the correctness of that decision, the judgment of the Court below is reversed.
Baldwin, J. I agree with the Chief Justice in the conclusion at which he has arrived. After an attentive examination of the case, I think we are precluded by the case of Richards v. McMillan, from holding that the failure to state more specifically the cause of action in the affidavit avoids the judgment. The want of this more complete statement is, at most, only prima facie evidence of fraud. Indeed, if disposed at all to interfere with that case, I should feel disposed, notwithstanding the New York cases, to question whether a judgment so confessed was evenprima facie fraudulent, mainly for the reason that the rule invoked, if such it can be called, requiring a fuller statement of the facts, wants the essential element of certainty. It is better to have a rule less correct than one better in the abstract, but more diffi- ■ cult of ascertainment and application. The question is not easy of answer, if the brief, general statement in this case is not sufficiently certain, what would be essential. How minute ought to be the statement of the transaction out of which the indebtedness confessed grows ? Is it to be governed by the circumstances of each particular case ? Then we should probably have litigation in each case to determine the sufficiency of the statement in that case. I cannot think the Legislature intended any more definiteness of particularity in case of confession of judgments than in complaints upon the same cpause of action in the ordinary course of procedure. But as this is a question of practice, and many judgments have probably been taken under it, we consider it better to let the decision in the case of Richards v. McMillan stand.
The other points made in the learned and elaborate brief of the appellants’ counsel, I think are not well taken. It is impossible in the pressure of business to consider at length the various questions raised. I think that the old rules of Chancery pleading are superseded by the Practice Act; that the material charges of fraud are all substantially denied in the answer. Those insufficiently stated, if admitted, are not sufficient to establish the fraud charged: that the deposition of the book-keeper of defendants having been taken on examination and
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