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20 Mo. 455

Van Doren v. Relfe

Supreme Court of Missouri

Decided March 15, 1855

Supreme Court of Missouri · decided 1855-03-15

This was' an action brought in January, 1852, to recover damages for the breach of a covenant of seizin contained in a deed from Relfe to Vandoren for certain land, dated August 13, 1836. The land was within what is known as the Iron Mountain tract, confirmed to Joseph Pratte by act of congress of July 4, 1886, and Relfe had no title at the time of his conveyance to Vandoren.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1855-03-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently January 1936

7 state decisions

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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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Scott, Judge,

¶1delivered the opinion of the court.

¶2The point relied upon by the defendant is, that this suit cannot be maintained in the name of Vandoren. There being no seizin in James H. Eelfe, of the land conveyed by him to Van-doren, the covenant of seizin contained in Relfe’s deed was broken immediately, and a right of action accrued thereon to Vandoren so soon as it was executed. So there was in Van-doren a right of action for unliquidated damages arising from a breach of contract. Vandoren afterwards assigned this right of action to trustees for the benefit of his creditors.

¶3The requirement• of the present practice act is, that every civil action must be prosecuted in the name of the real party in interest, with some exceptions. Among these is that of a suit by the trustees of an express trust. Now hut for this exception, this suit must have been brought in the name of the creditors. There was no interest in Vandoren which would have warranted a suit in his name. This is not like those cases in which a note is expressly made payable to a person who holds that note for the benefit of others, as in the case of Harney v. Dulcher, in which it was held, that the payee of the note was the trustee of an express trust. (15 Mo. Rep. 89.) Here Vandoren is the mere owner of unliquidated damages which he has assigned away. He then is in the situation of the holder of an open account, who, after he assigns it away, cannot maintain an action upon it in his own name. (Mauro v. Walker, 18 Mo. Rep. 564.)

¶4*457IE the right of action was not transferred to Vandoren’s trustees, then it continued in him until his bankruptcy, when it passed to his assignee. So, in whatever light the matter may be viewed, Vandoren has no right to institute suit in his own name. With the concurrence of the other judges, the judgment will be reversed.

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