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9 La. 417

Abat v. Buisson

Supreme Court of Louisiana

Decided May 15, 1836

Supreme Court of Louisiana · decided 1836-05-15

<p>A judgment is the highest evidence of a debt, and the title merges in the ■ judgment; but proof of its discharge may be made by presumptive or circumstantial evidence, as well as by positive proof.</p> <p>A judgment is the highest evidence of a debt, and the title merges in the judgment; but proof of its discharge may be made by presumptive or circumstantial evidence, as well as by positive proof.</p>

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1836-05-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 8 later decisions — most recently December 1987

8 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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Bullard, J.,

¶1delivered the opinion of the court.

¶2The appellee having filed an account of his administration of the estate of one Loiseau, Abat made opposition to its homologation, on the ground that he was an hypothecary creditor of the deceased, by virtue of a judgment rendered in 1827, and duly recorded with the register of mortgages, which had been omitted in the account; and he prays an amendment of the account, and that he be recognized as a creditor for the amount of said judgment.

¶3The curator, in his answer, admitted that such a judgment had been recovered and recorded, but he avers payment in the lifetime of his intestate.

¶4The opposition was overruled and dismissed, and Abat appealed.

¶5The principle contended for by the counsel for the appellant is admitted: that a judgment is the highest evidence of a debt, and that the original title merges in the judgment; but proof of the discharge of such judgment may be made by-presumptions as well as by positive evidence. In this case, it appears that the judgment was against Loiseau as endorser of a promissory note ; that judgment was also recovered against the drawer. Some time afterwards, the note was withdrawn from the record by the plaintiff’s counsel, who, being requested to erase the mortgage or enter satisfaction, answered, that the money had not passed through his hands, and he could not do it. It further appears, that on the 17th July, 1827, a fieri facias issued against the drawer; was returned by order of plaintiff's attorney, on the 31st of the same month, and on the 2d August the note was withdrawn, *419the costs having been paid on the 29th of July; and the note is not accounted for.

¶6This evidence satisfies us as it did the court of the first instance, that the debt had been paid, and the judgment extinguished.

¶7It is, therefore, ordered, adjudged and decreed, that the judgment of the Court of Probates be affirmed, with costs.

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