Hugo Black

“ No equitable principles require that one who, for his own reasons, guarantees a payee's signature after issuance of a check, shall be relieved of his voluntarily assumed obligation because others who owed the government obligations had previously defaulted in their obligations.
We do not say that there may not be some circumstances, not now before us, under which the government might be precluded from recovery because of conduct of a drawer prior to a guaranty of endorsement. ”

“ This guaranty was a protection which the government sought not only as to checks which were issued in due course for a valuable consideration, but as to checks which might have been irregularly issued. That the administrative officers failed fully to perform their duty is no reason why the government should be deprived of the advantage of a guarantee independently made by one who was not under compulsion of any kind to make it. ”

“ We do hold that negligence of a drawer-drawee in failing to discover fraud prior to a guaranty of the genuineness of prior endorsements does not absolve the guarantor from liability in cases where the prior endorsements have been forged. ”