Bass v. Biggs

118 So. 861, 167 La. 126, 1928 La. LEXIS 2022
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedOctober 29, 1928
DocketNo. 29057.
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 118 So. 861 (Bass v. Biggs) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bass v. Biggs, 118 So. 861, 167 La. 126, 1928 La. LEXIS 2022 (La. 1928).

Opinion

LAND, J.

On April 11, 1927, the defendant, J. I. Biggs, sold to Melvin F. Johnson, for a consideration of $1,000, lots 89 and 90 of the W. K. Henderson Iron Works & Supply Company subdivision of the village of Agurs, in the parish of Caddo.

At the date of this sale, a $10,000 mortgage existed upon the property and was duly recorded. This mortgage .was executed February 18, 1926, to secure a demand, note in that amount, made by the defendant, Biggs, payable to his own order and by him indorsed in blank.

Johnson purchased the lots “subject to the existing mortgage against said property.”

On September 15, 1927, B. A. Bass, the plaintiff, as the holder of the demand note, brought suit in the district court of Caddo parish, and proceeded via ordinaria to collect the note.

Johnson intervened in this suit, and set up several grounds as reasons why the special mortgage on the property should not be recognized and enforced, and prayed that Biggs, the vendor of the intervener, be called in warranty, and that plaintiff's suit be dismissed.

Later the intervener filed a plea .of estoppel against plaintiff’s asserting the note and mortgage in the case.

Judgment was rendered in favor of the intervener, dismissing plaintiff’s suit in so far as it attempts to enforce the mortgage against the property, and condemning plaintiff and defendant, in solido to pay the costs of the intervention. Plaintiff has appealed.

The main foundation of the intervention, - as well as of the plea of estoppel, is an agreement entered into by Bass and Biggs on April 16, 1926, and duly recorded.

In this agreement Biggs assigns, pledges, and rehypothecates to Bass the $10,000 mort *129 gage note sued upon, with the understanding that the note is to be delivered to Bass by the Securities Sales Company, the holder of the note as collateral for a loan of $25,000 to the Southern States Bottling Company of Cedar Grove, La., “as soon as the same has fulfilled its purpose with that concern; that is, upon the payment of the loan of the Southern States Bottling Company.”

It is further declared in this agreement that this contract and assignment shall continue in force “during the period of the loan in favor of the Southern States Bottling Company” and that “this assignment and pledge is irrevocable and in force and effect from date hereof on all parties concerned.”

On May 14, 1927, prior to bringing the present suit, and a month after the purchase of the property by intervener, Bass and Biggs entered into a second agreement, which was also recorded, in yrfñch it was agreed by Biggs that the Securities Sales Company should deliver the $10,000 mortgage note to B. A. Bass “at any) time and on any conditions the said company may see fit to do.”

The mortgage note was delivered to Bass, plaintiff, by the Securities Sales Company, a day or two before the present suit was filed.

Intervener contends that Bass, the plaintiff, is estopped in this suit, by virtue of the first agreement, from declaring that the note and mortgage are due at this time, and that his demands should be rejected for the reason that intervener “believed in the binding force of said agreement and the above state of said demand note, herein sued on, and that he purchased the property covered by the mortgage and surrendered the note he held against the vendor of said property, leased the property to another third party for three years, and otherwise acted to his prejudice on the faith of said recorded agreement.”

The loan of $25,000 by the Securities Sales Company to the Southern States Bottling Company was made March 11, 1925, and was payable in installments of $1,500 each every six months, with accrued interest on the whole obligation. This fact does not appear upon the face of the agreement of April 16, 1926, nor upon the face of the mortgage of $10,000.

However, upon the face of the recorded agreement made between Bass and Biggs April 16, 1926, it is clear that this agreement was not made for the benefit of any. future purchaser of the property mortgaged, but was intended primarily and solely for the purpose of adjusting between the parties thereto their respective rights, and especially for the purpose of securing, by the assignment and pledge of the collateral mortgage of $10,000, the indebtedness of $7,500 due by Biggs to Bass, the plaintiff.

It is clear, also, that the agreement could be changed at any time by the consent of the parties thereto, although denominated “an irrevocable assignment and pledge,” and declared to be intended to endure until the loan of $25,000 was paid the Securities Sales Company.

It is evident that the Securities Sales Company, if it so desired, could release the collateral note any time to Biggs before the payment of its loan by the Southern States Bottling Company, whether there was any recorded agreement or not to that effect.

That such an agreement cannot be made the basis of an estoppel is self-evident. It contains no stipulation pour autrui. The property mortgaged was not purchased by the intervener subject to such agreement, but “subject to the existing mortgage on said property,” as declared in the deed. The act of mortgage contains none of the stipulations upon which the intervener reliés to sustain his plea of estoppel.

The fact that such agreement was recorded does not change the situation, as its registry was not required by law. Its stipulations were purely private and personal, and did not *131 affect the rights of any third person at| the time they were made.

The act of mortgage contains the pact de non alienando. Intervener purchased the property cum onere and without assumpsit of the mortgage debt. It is well settled that:

“The purchaser of property with the pact de non alienando occupies no better position than the mortgagor, and cannot set up defenses which the latter could not.” La. Digest, vol. 5, Mortgages, par. Ill, p. 277.-

It is clear that Biggs, the debtor and mortgagor, could not plead estoppel in this case, based upon the ground that the demand note was not due, because of the terms of the first agreement entered into by Bass and himself, since, by the terms of the second agreement made between the parties, Biggs consented that this note be delivered to Bass, his creditor, by the Securities Sales Company, which, at the time, held the note as collateral.

Intervener, therefore, is without right to urge the plea of estoppel in the case at bar.

Intervener, however, relies upon the case of N. Y. Life Insurance Co. v. Hymel et al., 164 La. 103, 113 So. 782.

It was held in the case cited, quoting the syllabus:

“Subsequent mortgagee” has “no right to assume that provision of recorded prior mortgage, giving mortgagor privilege to sell sugar house and apply proceeds to last of notes, if sale should bring not less than $15,000, would require that such sale could not be made for less sum with consent of prior mortgagee.”

If a subsequent mortgagee cannot rely for protection upon such clause

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
118 So. 861, 167 La. 126, 1928 La. LEXIS 2022, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bass-v-biggs-la-1928.