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80 Pa. 149

Goodwin v. Sharkey

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania

Decided November 26, 1875

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania · decided 1875-11-26

<p>1. A lease was for a store-room, for two years, for the yearly rent of $2000, with the stipulation that if the lessee should, ‘‘ at any time during the continuance of this lease, attempt to remove or manifest an intention to remove his goods and effects out of or off the premises, without having paid * * * in full for all the rent which shall become due during the term of this lease * * * the whole rent for the whole term shall be taken to be due * * * and the (lessor) may proceed * * * to distrain and collect the whole as if by the conditions of this lease the'whole rent was payable in advance.” Held, that by the lease it was not required that the attempt or intention to remove the goods should be fraudulent in order to authorize a distress.</p> <p>2. The tenant becoming embarrassed sold and delivered goods to his creditors in payment of debts to them and made an assignment for benefit of creditors. Held, that the rent for the whole term had. become due and the landlord might distrain.</p> <p>3. The tenant assented to the distress and within four months proceedings in bankruptcy were commenced against him. Held not to be in fraud of the Bankrupt Law.</p> <p>4. Grant & McLane’s Appeal, 8 Wright 477, distinguished.</p>

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Decided 1875-11-26

How this case has been cited

Cited by 15 later decisions — most recently July 1949

4 district · 10 state decisions

5018751880189019001910192019301940decided

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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¶1Judgment was entered in the Supreme Court,

Per Curiam.

¶2Upon the plaintiff’s own evidence on the trial in the court below, the defendants had a right to distrain. The whole rent for the term might have been made payable in advance, and there exists no reason why it might not be made payable at any time during the running of the lease, upon the happening of any contingency. The right of distress would immediately arise. By the terms of the lease the whole rent became due whenever the lessee should attempt to remove or manifest an intention to remove his goods and effects out of or off from the demised premises without having paid and satisfied the lessors in full for all rent which should become payable during the term. There is nothing here requiring -the intention or attempt to be fraudulent. Grant & McLane’s Appeal, 8 Wright 477, is not applicable, for there the distress was not on the demised premises and could not be sustained on the provision of the lease, but only under the Act of Assembly, which requires the removal to be clandestine and fraudulent. The rejection of the assignment, if an error, did the plaintiff's no injury. Their case would not have been helped by its admission. There was nothing in the evidence to raise any question of fraud upon creditors under the bankrupt laws. Though the distress was within four months of the petition, and though the bankrupt did consent to it, that, according to later decisions, was not enough. The lessors were in the lawful pursuit of their rights and no evidence was given of collusion with the bankrupt.

¶3Judgment affirmed.

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