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21 Wis. 327

Whipple v. Barnes

Wisconsin Supreme Court

Decided January 15, 1867

Wisconsin Supreme Court · decided 1867-01-15

Action commenced in 1866, upon a mortgage executed by Barnes and wife in 1851, “ conditioned for' the payment of the sum and interest mentioned in ” a note of the same date for $700, payable in one year from date. Demurrer, on the ground that the alleged cause of action appears from the complaint not to have accrued within six years. The defendants appealed from an order overruling the demurrer.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1867-01-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 4 later decisions — most recently March 2018

4 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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Cole, J.

¶1In Wiswell v. Baxter, 20 Wis., 680, it was decided, that although a suit upon a promissory note which is secured by a mortgage, may be barred by the statute of limitations, yet an action may still be maintained to foreclose the mortgage. The six years’ limitation does not -bar the remedy upon the mortgage, but the mortgagee may foreclose and sell the mortgaged property. It was suggested on the argument, by the counsel for the appellants, that this should only be done where the mortgage contains an express covenant to pay the debt. The cases, however, do not establish any such limitation upon the right of action to foreclose the mortgage. Thayer v. Mann, 19 Pick., 535; Jay v. Adams, 26 Me., 330; Baldwin v. Norton, 2 Conn., 161; Richmond v. Aiken, 25 Vt., 324; Borst v. Corey, 15 N. Y., 506.

¶2*329The action to foreclose is upon an instrument under seal, which acknowledges the debt the payment of which it is given to secure. And it being thus under seal, the equitable remedy upon it is not lost, although an action upon the note may be barred.

¶3By the Court. — The order overruling the demurrer to the complaint, is affirmed.

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