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Browsing: Legal Papers of John Adams, Volume 1

Prout's “Bill in Chancery” -

[1763-02]
Humbly petitioning showeth Timothy ...

Adams' Minutes of the Argument1

Suffolk Superior Court, Boston, August 1766

Docno: LJA01d067

Author: JA
Date: 1766-08
Prout vs. Minot.
Fitch.
2 Vernon 539. 540. Payment to Obligee, after Notice of an Assignment is not good. The Assignee alone is entituled to the Money.2
Choses in Action are assignable in Equity, 'tho not in Law.
Jones's Reps. Page 223. 223. Lewis vs. Wallis.3
Tho the Action must be in the Name of Assignor, yet it is considered in Equity and even in Law, as the Property of the assignee.
The real Interest in the present Case is in Brown.
{p. 242}
Gridley. Seem'd to conceed.
Judge Lynde. The Court has determin'd that if the Land mortgaged is insufficient to pay the Debt, mortgagee may have recourse to his Bond, and may sue both, i.e. Bond and Mortgage.4
1753, Bond and Mortgage was given to Minot.
1755, Bond and Mortgage of the same Land was given to Brown.
After, Brown sued his Mortgage had Judgment and enterd on Possession and
After, Minots Mortgage was assignd to Brown.5
The great Fire in March 1760, burning the House occasiond this Dispute.
 
1. In JA's hand. Adams Papers, Microfilms, Reel No. 185.
 
2. Baldwin v. Billingsley, 2 Vern. 539, 23 Eng. Rep. 950 (Ch. 1705). Baldwin had borrowed £200 from a trust, giving the trustees a bond in that amount which recited the trust. The bond was delivered to Mrs. Billingsley, the beneficiary. Baldwin paid £100 to one of the trustees who gave him a receipt in the name of the trust, then absconded. The Lord Keeper ruled for Mrs. Billingsley, saying, id. at 540, “Mr. Baldwin ought to have been cautious how he paid the Money; it being in Equity the Money of Billingsley, as much as if the Bond had been assigned to her; and Payment to the Obligee after Notice of an Assignment is not good: In the Case of an Assignment of a Bond the Assignee alone becomes intitled to receive the Money.”
 
3. Lewis v. Wallis, T. Jones 222, 223, 84 Eng. Rep. 1228 (K.B. 1683), held that attachment in an action of debt did not lie against an asset assigned by the debtor to a third party.
 
4. That is, the earlier decision of the court on this point at the Aug. 1762 term of the Superior Court. See text and note 9 above.
 
5. Commas supplied in this and the preceding three paragraphs for clarity.
Cite web page as: Founding Families: Digital Editions of the Papers of the Winthrops and the Adamses, ed.C. James Taylor. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2007.
http://www.masshist.org/ff/