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14 Ala. 568

Nelson v. Lovejoy

Supreme Court of Alabama

Decided June 15, 1848

Supreme Court of Alabama · decided 1848-06-15

Before the Hon. G. W. Stone. “ Mayberry Lovejoy sued Robert Nelson, before a justice of the peace, on a note for $27 44. Judgment was rendered by the justice in favor of the plaintiff, and Nelson removed the cause by certiorari to the circuit court.

Relies on Harbin v. Levi

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1848-06-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 3 later decisions — most recently December 1942

3 state decisions

1018481850186018701880189019001910192019301940decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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DARGAN, J.

¶1We do not think the evidence showed an entire failure of consideration. The plaintiff in error was to call on the defendant after letters of administration on the estate of Young was granted to him, and the defendant was to execute a receipt to him as .administrator. But it does not appear that the plaintiff ever requested the defendant, after the grant of letters to him, to execute the receipt as administrator, .or that the defendant ever declined doing it, or as administrator ever demanded of the plaintiff the debt due the estate, in-.any =other manner than to demand payment of the note. When the consideration of a note is something to be done by the. payee afterwards, the defendant does not show a failure of consideration by merely proving that the consideration was-an act to be done by the payee, upon the request of the maker ; he must go further, and show that he requested the payee to do the act, and that he failed to do it; otherwise he does not show a failure of consideration. It is true, that it w;puld be sufficient to show an incapacity on the part oí the-*571payee, to do the act he promised to perform, which was the consideration, and if the payee was legally incapable of doing the act, it would be unnecessary to make the request. But it is not shown that the defendant in error was unable to give a valid receipt as the administrator of Young ; on the contrary, it is shown by the testimony introduced by the defendant, that Lovejoy was the administrator of Young, at the time the suit was brought. The authorities relied on by the plaintiff in error are not applicable. The case of Levi v. Harbin, 6 Ala. 399, only affirms the rule, that an administrator cannot maintain a suit on a note given to him as such, after he has been removed from office. It is not shown that the defendant in error was removed, but on the contrary it is shown that he was the administrator.

¶2We see no error in the refusal of the court to give the charge requested. Let the judgment be affirmed.

Chilton, not sitting.
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