Recoupment

In practice

Defalcation or discount from a demand. A keeping back something which is due, because there is an equitable reason to withhold it.

Tomlins.

Recoupment is a right of the defendant to have a deduction from the amount of the plaintiff's damages, for the reason that the plaintiff has not complied with the cross-obligations or independent covenants arising under the same contract.

Code Ga. 1882, § 2909.

It is keeping back something which la due because there ls an equitable reason to withhold it; and ls now uniformly applied where a man brings an action for breach of a contract between him and the defendant; and where the latter can show that some stipuiation in the same contract was made by the plaintiff, which he has violated, the defendant may, if he choose, instead of suing in his turn, recoupe his damages arising from the breach committed by the plaintiff, whether they be liquidated or not.

Ives v. Van Eppes, 22 Wend. (N. Y.) 156. And see Barber v. Chapin, 28 Vt. 413; Lawton v. Ricketts, 104 Ala. 480, 16 South. 59; Aultman v. Torrey, 55 Minn. 492, 57 N. W. 211; Dietrich v. Ely, 63 Fed. 413, 11 C. C. A. 266; The Wellsville v. Geissie, 3 Ohio St. 341; Nichols v. Dusenbury, 2 N. Y. 286; Myers v. Estell, 47 Miss. 23.

In speaking of matters to be shown in defense, the term "recoupment" la often used as synonymous with "reduction." The term is of French origin, and siguifies catting again, or cutting back, and, as a defense, means the cutting back on the plaintiff's claim by the defendant. Like reduction, it is of necessity limited to the amount of the plaintiff's claim. It is properly applicable to a case where the same contract imposes mutual duties and obligations on the two parties, and one seeks a remedy for the breach of duty by the second, and the second meets the demand by a claim for the breach of duty by the first. Davenport v. Hubbard, 46 Vt. 207, 14 Am. Rep. 620. "Recoupment" differs from "set-off"in this respect; that any claim or demand the defendant may have against the plaintiff may be used as a set-off, while It ls not a subject for recoupment unless it grows out of the very same transaction which furnishes the plaintiff's cause of action. The term is, as appears above, synonymous with "reduction;" but the latter is not a techuical term of the law; the word "defalcation," in one of its meanings, expresses the same idea, and is used interchangeably with recoupment. Recoupment, as a remedy, corresponds to the reconvention of the civil law.