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29 Md. 18

Chenowith v. Smith

Court of Appeals of Maryland

Decided May 19, 1868

Court of Appeals of Maryland · decided 1868-05-19

A bill was filed in the Circuit Court of Baltimore City by Frederick Fickey, Jr., and Andrew J. Fickey, against George E. Chenowith and Thomas M. Dukehart, alleging the existence of a co-partnership between the complainants and the defendants under the name of Fickey Brothers, for the purpose of manufacturing and selling a certain reaping and mowing machine, for which said Chenowith had obtained a patent right; and asking for a dissolution of the partnership, a settlement of…

Relies on Morgan's Lessee v. Davis · Balch v. Zentmeyer

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1868-05-19

How this case has been cited

Cited by 3 later decisions — most recently March 1971

3 state decisions

10186818701880189019001910192019301940195019601970decided

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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Alvey, J.,

¶1delivered the opinion of the court.

¶2This appeal 'must be dismissed. The ordei: from which it is taken is not final in its character. It is not a final decree, or an order in the nature of a final decree, such as is contemplated by Art. 5, sec. 20, Code of Pub. Gen. Laws. Nor is it embraced by sec. 21 of the same Article, giving the right of appeal in special cases. It is true, the prayer of the petitioner, Charles Chenowith, was refused, but only for the titne. The petition was not dismissed, but was retained, and the subject matter of it reserved for the future order of the court. No question of right, therefore, was finally determined. See Wheeler v. Stone, 4 Gill, 39.

¶3But, in thus disposing of the appeal, we think it proper to say, that, in our opinion, the court below was greatly in error in not at once surrendering all control over the fund, sought to be withdrawn from its officer. The injunction had been ^dissolved, and the receiver discharged, and there was no longer any colorable justification for holding the property. It had been determined by the Court of Appeals that there was no foundation for the injunction, nor for the continuation of the receiver, as to the particular property how in question ; *24and upon the discharge of the receiver the property was released. And as there appears to be no question as to the genuineness of the assignment of George E. Chenowith to Charles Chenowith, the fund in the hands of the receiver, representing the property taken and sold, should have been ordered to be paid over to such assignee.

¶4Nor do we see any valid objection to the mode of proceeding adopted to recover the fund from the hands of the receiver. But looking to dispatch, and the convenience of the thing, we think it was the most appropriate that could have been resorted to. And we think the precedents, sanctioned in the practice of the Courts of Equity of this State, fully justify it. See Balch v. Zentmeyer, 11 G. & J. 267; Glenn v. Gill, 2 Md. 16.

¶5We have said this much in reference to the merits of the case, although not properly before us, that additional expense and litigation may be avoided, and that the court below may, by further order, do what ought to have been done in the first instance.

¶6Appeal dismissed.

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