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60 Ill. 49

Mead v. Munson

Illinois Supreme Court

Decided September 15, 1871

Illinois Supreme Court · decided 1871-09-15

<p>Appeal from the Circuit Court of Kankakee county; the Hon. Charles H. Wood, Judge, presiding.</p> <p>This was an action brought by Munson against Mead, on a promissory note executed by the latter in favor of Horn & Hanna, the payees having assigned the note to the plaintiff. The defense interposed was, that the execution of the note was obtained through fraud and circumvention. The plaintiff recovered a judgment in the circuit court, and the defendant appeals.</p>

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““The maker of the note could read and write with facility and could not have been imposed upon if he had exercised the most ordinary prudence.””

quoted by 1 later decision, including Murray v. Metropolitan Trust & Savings Bank

Relies on Taylor v. Atchison · Leach v. Nichols

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1871-09-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 6 later decisions — most recently January 1911

6 state decisions

2018711880189019001910decided

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.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

Per Curiam :

¶1Was there fraud and circumvention in obtaining the execution of the note ?

¶2The maker of the note was the only witness.

¶3He testified that the note was given for the privilege of selling the patent right of a hay-loading machine within certain territory; that it was represented to him that if he would give his note, a guaranty should be written upon the back of it that it should not be paid unless the machine proved to be profitable; and that the machine was worthless.

¶4The note was introduced in evidence, and had no guaranty indorsed upon it.

¶5On cross examination, the witness stated that he took a daily newspaper; could read very well; could read writing; that he knew the contents of the note before signing it; that the guaranty was Avritten on another piece of paper, and that he supposed it was written upon the note.

¶6The note was assigned by the pajees before maturity.

¶7Under the proof, we can not infer the fraud and circumvention intended by the statute, which shall void the note. To do so, would be to offer a premium for gross negligence.

¶8The maker of the note could read and write with facility, and could not have been imposed upon if he had exercised the most ordinary prudence.

¶9The principle involved in this case is fully settled in Taylor v. Atchison, 54 Ill. 196; Leach v. Nichols, 55 Ill. 273.

¶10The judgment must be affirmed.

¶11Judgment affirmed.

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