Joy v. Farmers Nat. Bank of Chickasha

1932 OK 325, 11 P.2d 1074, 158 Okla. 1, 1932 Okla. LEXIS 892
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedApril 26, 1932
Docket20773
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 1932 OK 325 (Joy v. Farmers Nat. Bank of Chickasha) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Joy v. Farmers Nat. Bank of Chickasha, 1932 OK 325, 11 P.2d 1074, 158 Okla. 1, 1932 Okla. LEXIS 892 (Okla. 1932).

Opinion

CULLISON, J.

Defendant ini error herein, plaintiff below, instituted suit in the district court of Grady county, Okla. (cause No. 10808), seeking to recover for the conversion of 25 bales of cotton represented by 25 warehouse receipts delivered to plaintiff as security for a loan of $1,875.

*2 Plaintiff filed a second suit in the district court of Grady county, Okla. (cause No. 10809), seeking to recover a similar amount and under the same circumstances as enumerated in cause No. 10808.

The elements involved in both eases being-identical, said eases were consolidated for trial, which trial resulted in judgment for plaintiff bank.

Defendant appeals to this court.

The parties will be referred to as they appear in the lower court.

The record discloses: That defendant, M. A. Joy, owned and operated a cotton compress and storage warehouse in Chiek-asha, Okla. That W. D. Trueblood was the general manager of defendant’s business at Chickasha and was in complete charge and control of said business. That defendant Joy resided in Texas and was se.dom at the Ohickasha plant. Trueblood approached the plaintiff and requested a loan of money from plaintiff. He presented 25 warehouse receipts which he offered as security for said loan, each warehouse receipt representing one bale of cotton located in defendant’s warehouse.

Plaintiff made said loan to Trueblood and took his note with the 23 warehouse receipts as security for the loan. The loan was not paid at maturity. Plaintiff demanded of defendant that defendant surrender to plaintiff the cotton represented by the 25 warehouse receipts. Defendant refused to deliver' said cotton.

The record further shows that the warehouse receipts pledged by Trueblood to plaintiff were receipts covering cotton that had been delivered to defendant’s warehouse, and that the owners of said cotton had surrendered the receipts to defendant Joy upon receipt of their cotton and that Trueblood, as superintendent of defendant’s warehouse, had wrongfully taken said receipts and pledged them to the bank instead of canceling the same as should have been done when the receipts were surrendered by the owners of the cotton upon delivery of the cotton to them.

Defendant’s first specification of error is that:

“Defendant’s cotton compress is not a public warehouse and the public warehouse statutes have no application.”

“Warehouseman” is defined under section 11180, O. O. S. 1921, as follows:

“11180. Terms Defined: (1) In this act, unless the context or subject-matter otherwise requires— * * * ‘Warehouseman’ means a person lawfully engaged in the business of storing goods for a profit. * * *”

We observe that under the definition, a “warehouseman” means a person lawfully engaged in the business of storing goods for profit.

In the case of Traders' Compress Co. v. Precure, 140 Okla. 40, 282 P. 165, at page 42 in the opinion (282 P. 167), this court held:

“In the case of Citizens’ State Bank ot Vici v. Gettig, 77 Okla. 48, 187 P. 217, 218, this court held:

“ ‘The Uniform Warehouse Receipts Act defines and fixes the rights and liabilities of the parties in storing of grain, and is a full and complete treatise on the subject, and makes no distinction between public and private warehouses or between bonded and un-bonded warehouses, but regulates the storage of goods.’

“Therefore the defendant compress company, although a private warehouse, comes within the terms of the above-quoted statute.”

In accordance with the above decision of this court, it is immaterial whether defendant was a public or private warehouse, because said warehouse comes within the terms of the Warehouse Act of this state.

We will consider defendant’s second and third propositions! together, which said propositions are:

(2) “That the cotton tickets in controversy are not warehouse receipts, and the Uniform Warehouse Receipts Act has no application, such instruments being cotton weight tickets and not negotiable warehouse receipts.

(8) “If the cotton tickets can be construed to be warehouse receipts within the provisions of the Uniform Warehouse Receipts Act, yet such tickets are not negotiable under the provisions of such act.”

Section 11124, C. O. S. 1921, is a section of our statute describing what a warehouse receipt shall contain.

Briefly summarized, said section provides that said receipt shall contain the location of the warehouse, date of issue, consecutive number of the receipt, whether the goods will be delivered to bearer or specified person or his order, rate of storage, description of the goods, signature, if issued for goods of which the warehouseman is owner solely or jointly with others, statement of such fact, and the amount of lien claimed by warehouseman.

*3 The following sections of our statute are applicable to the matter under discussion: Sections 11156, 11127, and 11129, O. O. S. 1921.

“11126. Nonnegotiable: A receipt in which it is stated that the goods received will be delivered to the depositor, or to any other specified person is a nonnegotiable receipt.

“11127. Warehouse Receipts Negotiable: A receipt in which it is stated that the goods received will be delivered to the bearer, or to the order of any person named in such receipt, is a negotiable receipt. No provision shall be inserted in a negotiable receipt that it is nonnegotiable. Such provision, if inserted, shall be void.”

“11129. Nonnegotiable Receipts: A nonnegotiable receipt shall have plainly placed upon its face by the warehouseman issuing it ‘nonnegotiable,’ or ‘not negotiable.’ In case of the warehouseman’s failure so to do, a holder of the receipt who purchased it for value supposing it to be negotiable, may, at his option, treat such receipt as imposing upon the warehouseman the same liabilities he would have incurred had the receipt been negotiable. This section shall not apply, however, to letters, memoranda, or written acknowledgments of an informal character.”

Section 11126 describes a nonnegotiable receipt, and section 11127 describes the provisions of a negotiable receipt, but section 11129 imposes a further restriction upon a nonnegotiable receipt and provides that the receipt shall have plainly placed upon its face by the warehouseman issuing it, “nonnegotiable,” or “not negotiable.” Said section further provides that if the warehouseman fails to so do, the liability of the warehouseman would be the same as though the receipt had been negotiable, in the hands of a holder of the receipt who purchased it for value, supposing it to be negotiable.

The warehouse receipts in question in the case at bar are attached to the record and do not provide by specific words that said property will be delivered to the order or to bearer. Said receipt provides, after describing the property covered in said receipt, “to be delivered only on return of this receipt and payment of all charges.”

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Bluebook (online)
1932 OK 325, 11 P.2d 1074, 158 Okla. 1, 1932 Okla. LEXIS 892, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/joy-v-farmers-nat-bank-of-chickasha-okla-1932.