Rogers v. Ogden Bldg. & Sav. Ass'n

83 P. 754, 30 Utah 188, 1905 Utah LEXIS 66
CourtUtah Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 2, 1905
DocketNo. 1637
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 83 P. 754 (Rogers v. Ogden Bldg. & Sav. Ass'n) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Utah Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Rogers v. Ogden Bldg. & Sav. Ass'n, 83 P. 754, 30 Utah 188, 1905 Utah LEXIS 66 (Utah 1905).

Opinions

STRAUP, J.

1. Tbe Ogden Building & Savings Association was a corporation organized in 1898 under tbe general incorporation act of tbe then territory of Utah, and, while not technically known as a building and loan association, to some extent it partook of tbe nature of such associations. Tbe purpose of this organization, as stated in its articles of incorporation, was “the accumulation of a fund by tbe savings of tbe members thereof sufficient to enable each shareholder to invest bis savings safely and speedily, and to purchase real estate, or to irívest tbe same as may be deemed by him most profitable, and that each shareholder may have tbe benefit of tbe aggregate capital which co-operation produces, and loaning money to shareholders for tbe purpose of enabling them to erect buildings, and otherwise loaning and investing money, and the purchasing and holding real estate for the purposes and benefits of the association.” It was also provided by its constitution and by-laws that “each and every shareholder, for each and every share of stock that he had subscribed for, paid the sum of fifty cents subscription fee, and the sum of one dollar each and every month thereafter, until the value of the stock in which the series to which the subscription was made became sufficient to divide to each share of the said stock the sum of one hundred dollars.” It was also shown that the association had separate, distinct, and consecutive series of stock numbered from 1 to 31. Subscribers purchased of said corporation shares of its capital stock, paying therefor in monthly installments until the amount paid, as aforesaid, together with the natural earnings of said association, equaled the sum of $100 or more per share, when, as is conceded by all parties, and as is alleged in their pleadings by the appellants, “the said shares of stock should be fully matured, and the association agreed to and with such stockholders to then and there pay them in lawful money of the United States the amount at which said shares of stock had matured.” About the year 1890 respondent Rogers took out and was the bolder of thirty-five shares of what is known as the “Fifteenth Series” of said capital stock, and from thence on continuously [193]*193made monthly payments thereon until the 30th clay of September, 1898, when said stock was fully paid and matured. All previous series, Having been therefore matured and paid for by the association and- retired, the association^ on the day last aforesaid, by resolution of its board of directors in a regular meeting, declared the said thirty-five shares of stock matured and then and there payable to the said Eogers at $102 per share, amounting in the aggregate to $3,570. Thereafter the association made partial payments thereon, leaving on June 26, 1903, a balance due and unpaid of about $2,700. Upon repeated demands made by respondent Eogers for his money, and upon failure of the association to pay it, on October 3, 1'903, he commenced his suit against said association for the collection of the same. The defendant association appeared and demurred to the complaint, and. its demurrer being overruled, on November 19, 1903, it answered. In the meantime, and on the 2d day of November, 1903, the appellant Driver commenced an action against the defendant association, alleging its insolvency, and asked for the appointment of a receiver. On the same day the defendant association, through appellant Crossman, its president, filed an answer admitting all the allegations of Driver’s said complaint, appeared in court, and consented to the appointment of a receiver, and on said day last named one Kelly was appointed receiver for said association. On November 9; 1908, respondent Eogers was given leave to file a complaint in intervention in said suit, which was done by him. Later appellant Grossman, who was a stockholder in a series subsequent to the fifteenth, for himself, and on assigned.claims to him of stockholders also in series subsequent to the fifteenth, except one Tracey, who was of the fifteenth series, also filed a complaint in intervention in the said action. The actions were consolidated and brought on for trial before the court. It appears from the record that, in the filing of the various pleadings in said causes, the defendant association, the plaintiff Driver praying for the appointment of a receiver, the intervener Crossman, and the receiver himself were all represented by [194]*194one and the same counsel. The principal contest at the trial was as to whether respondent Kogers was a creditor or mere stockholder of the association, and as to whether; by reason of the premises, his claim should be preferred, and therefore should be paid out of the assets of the association before paying members in series subsequent to the fifteenth. There were no so-called general or outside creditors. The constitution and the by-laws of the association were put in evidence, and evidence was also given with respect to its series of stock, and as to the manner in which prior series were treated and preferred by the association and its members over subsequent series.

Among other things the court found as follows:

“(3) The court further finds that from the inception of the business of said defendant association its uniform, exclusive, and continuous course of business and rule of corporate action, to which all of its shareholders have at all times assented, and under which they have subscribed for their stock in the corporation, was that it divided its subscription to its stock every six months into separate, distinct, and consecutive series, subscriptions being continuously solicited, and the subscribers in each semiannual period in which sufficient shares were subscribed being classed together as shareholders of a ‘series’ numbered from 1 upward to 37, commencing with the earliest subscriptions, and the subscribers to each separate series being treated alike in respect to the maturity and payment of their shares in said series, and separate from all other series; that up to the time the fifteenth series matured, as hereinafter found, the stockholders in each successive series of the fourteenth previous series of stock, at the time the said stock in any such series became of $100 or more in value per share by reason of the payments and profit, if any, theretofore made upon such stock, were treated by the association as sellers of their stock to the association, and as being creditors of the association who were entitled to have the matured value of their shares paid to them in money or by credit upon loans made by the association to any of the borrowing stockholders in such matured series; that the association paid off each sue-[195]*195cessive matured series in preference to any claims of its members in the subsequent or junior series (except that stock, withdrawn in accordance with the constitution and by-laws, upon notice of withdrawal given prior to the maturity of any series, was paid in preference to stock of an earlier series maturing after such withdrawn stock became payable under the rules of said company) and that after payment in full, as far as the shares in the matured series were concerned, the holders ceased to be either stockholders or creditors, while all the stockholders in all the unmatured series carried on the business of the association, and that on a number of occasions the association borrowed money to pay off the mature price of stock in matured series.”

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Bluebook (online)
83 P. 754, 30 Utah 188, 1905 Utah LEXIS 66, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rogers-v-ogden-bldg-sav-assn-utah-1905.