Van Amringe v. Peabody

28 F. Cas. 933, 1 Mason C.C. 440

• Court: U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Massachusetts
• Decided: October 15, 1818
• Status: Published

Opinion

STORY, Circuit Justice.

It is extremely difficult to find any foundation in the facts of this cause, on which to raise an argument, that the goods were sold, and not pledged, to the defendants. The whole current of the evidence is decidedly the other way. Then, as to the law, it is quite too late to doubt the doctrine, that a factor has no authority to pledge the goods of his principal for his own debts. If he does pledge them, the principal is entitled to recover them from the person in whose hands they are pledged. Here the goods have been sold, and the proceeds received by the defendants; and, in point of law, the sale was a tortious conversion, for which the defendants are responsible in this form of action. There are other difficulties in the way of the defendants which seem almost insurmountable. Messrs. Damon & Co. were not, in any correct sense, the general agents of the plaintiff; they were merely limited agents or factors, as to these particular consignments. They had no authority from their principal to pledge the goods, or to sell them at auction, or to procure advances on them, or to enter into any illegal or usurious contract on his account. Their whole proceedings, therefore, were unauthorized; and the defendants well knew, that they were acting, not for themselves, but as factors. Certainly, under such circumstances, the defendants cannot resist the plaintiff’s claim for a full indemnification for the loss he sustained by their acts.

Verdict for the plaintiff for $2,299.35.