Opinion
05-17-1886
SCOVILLE MANUF'G CO. and others v. LINDSEY and another.
E. A. & W. T. Day, for complainants.
E. A. & W. T. Day, for complainants.
WILLIAMS, Advisory Master. Careful examination of evidence on part of complainants fully convinces me that each of them gave the original credit for the goods, of choice, to William H. Lindsey, and not to the firm known as the New York Show-case Company, composed of Lindsey and Sauer, and the result thus reached accords with general business usages under like circumstances, and also with the testimony of Lindsey as to the original dealings, and with the subsequent acts of both parties ante litem motam. The complainants have therefore no standing, as firm creditors, to assert any equities against the effect of the Booth judgment and levy. They are Lindsey's creditors, and were subject to his legal right to prefer another creditor over them.
It was suggested that if they are creditors of Lindsey alone, and he is creditor of the firm for the same goods, they might have an equity to avail themselves of his claim against the firm, and so be entitled to the equities of firm creditors. I find no authority for this, and, besides, it would work as well for Mrs. Booth as for them, and then, as she has the legal priority, the maxim would apply that where equities are equal the law prevails. The complainants having no title to relief against Mrs. Booth, and she having by consent taken the place by her bond of the chattels covered by complainants' mortgage, no other relief is attainable under their bill, and it should be dismissed, with costs.