Promissory note

“ In that case, the action being brought on a certificate of deposit, the court said, 'the instrument in question is in effect a negotiable promissory note.
Thus, then, stands the case. The paper in controversy has all the requisites which an unbroken current of decisions has pronounced essential to a promissory note. It is a promise to pay a sum of money certain, at a fixed time, for value received. It was regarded by the maker, by the defendant, and by the plaintiffs, as a negotiable promissory note. ”

“ Parol evidence of an agreement, made contemporaneously with a promissory note which contains an absolute promise to pay at a specified time, is not admissible in order to extend the time for payment, or to provide for the payment out of any particular fund, or in any other way than that specified in the instrument, or to make the payment depend upon condition. ”

“ Every negotiable promissory note, even if not purporting to be 'for value received,' imports a consideration. Mandeville v. Welch, 5 Wheat. 277; Page v. Bank, 7 Wheat. 35; Townsend v. Derby, 3 Metc. (Mass.) ”

“ And the addition of a new person as a principal maker of a promissory note, rendering all the promisors, apparently, jointly and equally liable, not only to the holder, but also as between themselves, and so far tending to lessen the ultimate liability of the original maker or makers, has been held in the courts of some of the states to be a material alteration. ”

“ They are in precisely the same plight as a promissory note payable to order and indorsed in blank, or to bearer, the title to which passes by mere delivery. Chitty, Bills, 252, 253 (8th ed.) ; Bayley, Bills, c. ”

“ When, therefore, a man sells a solvent promissory note, he sells a legal title to, or claim to, or lien upon, so much actual property in the hands of the maker of the note as is necessary to pay the note; property which men have just as much right to buy and sell from hand to hand as money, if they so please, – that is, in exchange for other property, – as they have to buy and sell coin, or any other money that can be invented. ”

“ When a promissory note made payable to a particular person or order is first indorsed by a third person, such third person is held to be an original promisor, guarantor, or indorser, according to the nature of the transaction and the understanding of the parties at the time the transaction took place.
1. If he put his name in blank on the back of the note at the time it was made and before it was indorsed by the payee, to give the maker credit with the payee, or if he participated in the consideration of the note, he must be considered as a joint maker of the note. ”

“ An accepted draft is only another form of a promissory note, for if A owes B $1,000, and B draws upon A for that amount, and A accepts the draft, A is in precisely the same position as he would have been if he had sent B his promissory note for $1,000. ”

“ It is what is always implied in every promissory note or bill of exchange,-that it is to be presented and surrendered when paid. As well might it be said that a note payable on demand is payable upon a contingency, and therefore non-negotiable, as to affirm that one payable on its presentation and surrender is, for that reason, destitute of negotiability. ”

“ The gentleman will find laws and decisions in abundance, regulating the effect of endorsements and other collateral circumstances, and prescribing the manner of enforcing the payment of promissory notes, but he will never find a law giving the right to execute the promissory note. ”

“ A promissory note, a certificate of stock, or a bond which is an evidence of something tangible or the right to obtain something tangible, is the subject of a pledge, as well as furniture, jewelry and other tangible personal property. ”

“ Instruments containing the essential features of a promissory note, but issued by corporations in numbers under a trust indenture, either in registered form or with coupons attached, embodying provisions for acceleration of maturity in the event of any default by the obligor, for optional registration in the case of bearer bonds, for authentication by the trustee, and sometimes for redemption before maturity, or similar provisions, are bonds within the meaning of the statute, whether called bonds, debentures, or notes. ”

“ But the kind of liability incurred, whether that of indorser, original promisor, or surety, by indorsing a note or guarantying payment, is not the same in all the states. There are sundry other points in the law relating to promissory notes, on which the statutes and judicial decisions are not uniform in all the states.
Chapter LXI. Bills of Exchange; Interest; Usury. §1. A bill of exchange is a written order or request to a person in a distant place, to pay a third person a certain sum of money. The following is a common form:
$1,000. ”

“ If A., by the highest class of express contract, say a promissory note or bond, promise to pay B. ten thousand dollars on a day fixed, and fail to do it, B. can only recover interest for the delay, though he may have depended on that money to save his homestead from sacrifice, and has lost it by reason of that failure, So a man buying real estate may improve, adorn, and have it grow in his hand to a value ten times what he gave for it ”

“ That point is, whether a promissory note payable to the order of several persons, one of whom inceptively refused to be a payee of it, and who was treated by the drawer and other payees, both in the delivery of the note and in its negotiation, as no party and having no interest in it, can be transferred by the indorsement of the real payees, so as to give the ownership of it to the indorsee, and a right of action upon it ex directo, under the statute of 3 & 4 Anne, c. ”

“ In either case, the holder, other things being equal, acquires full title to the instrument, the correct commercial rule being that whoever lawfully and in good faith becomes the holder of a valid negotiable bill of exchange or promissory note before maturity, by direct indorsement or by delivery when indorsed in blank or made payable to bearer, assumes the responsibility, if not paid when it falls due, of entering protest or of making demand and giving notice of non-payment as the case may require ”

“ Promissory notes, given for the payment of money, without any condition or contingency, and payable to order or bearer, are as much commercial instruments as bills of exchange, and the title to the same, and their transfer from one person to another, are governed and regulated by the same rules of commercial law. ”

“ When a debtor wishes to pawn promissory notes, bills of exchange, stocks, obligations, or claims upon other persons, he shall deliver to the creditors the notes, bills of exchange, certificates of stock, or other evidence of the claims or rights so pawned ”

“ Will any one assert that shipping promissory notes differs in the slightest degree from shipping eggs, apples, potatoes, cotton, grain or live stock on the ground that promissory notes are not property, but that eggs, apples, potatoes, cotton, grain and live stock are property? ”

“ Traders and merchants, also, who frequently take promissory notes for money due and payable to them or to their order at a certain date, and who sometimes have occasion for the money before the time elapses, procure these notes to be discounted by bankers before the time of payment, so that the latter deduct the interest which will become due by the time such notes are payable. ”

“ In the business of great cities, among merchants and bankers and tradesmen, nothing could be done without incessant faith in promises. Every man of sense knows that cheques and bills and promissory notes are the only means by which the immense majority of mercantile affairs can possibly be carried on. ”

“ This is done in a very convenient manner by lending their own promissory notes payable to bearer on demand—the borrower being willing to accept these as so much money, because the credit of the lender makes other people willingly receive them on the same footing, in purchases or other payments. These notes, therefore, perform all the functions of currency, and render an equivalent amount of money, which was previously in circulation, unnecessary. ”

“ Laws 1880, § 2013. The power of the state legislatures to establish such a rule prospectively, with regard to promissory notes made and payable within their respective jurisdictions, has not been and cannot be doubted. ”

“ The proviso of the fifth section, that 'the act of limitations shall apply to all bonds, bills, and other securities hereafter executed, made transferable by this act, after the assignment or indorsement thereof, in the same manner as it operates by law against promissory notes,' cannot, we think, be fairly construed to extend the act of limitations in its operation on promissory notes. ”

“ The promissory notes of their customers, which constitute the major part of their assets, give no information on this point, and they have not made the investigations necessary to determine with certainty the destination of the funds they have loaned. They are satisfied with the knowledge or the conviction that their loans can be collected, not at maturity—they know very well that many, probably most, of them can not—but ultimately. ”

“ Promissory notes, interchanged between scheming individuals, are liberally discounted at the banks, which become so many mints to coin words into cash; and as the supply of words is inexhaustible, it may readily be supposed what a vast amount of promissory capital is soon in circulation. Every one now talks in thousands ”

“ Where the promise is to pay on demand at a particular place, there is no cause of action until the demand is made; and the maker of the note cannot discharge himself by an offer of payment, the note not being due until demanded. ”

“ Other State decisions, too numerous for citation, hold that a party taking a negotiable note in payment of, or as a collateral security for, a precedent debt, is a bona fide holder for a valuable consideration, and that he is entitled to the same protection as a holder who receives the same in payment for goods delivered at the time of the transfer, or one who pays cash for the instrument when it is delivered. ”

“ The deed, in effect, declares, and its record gives notice to subsequent purchasers, that its purpose is to secure the payment of such interest as has been reserved by the note; the amount, and date, and time of payment of which are mentioned. We do not think the mere omission to describe in the deed what that interest was to be, is a defect of which advantage can be taken by the complainants. ”

“ The reason that such a sale of a note is said to be usurious is, that the indorser who disposes of it is liable; and yet the sale of a bill of exchange, the payment of which is guarantied by the seller, is valid. ”

“ When a contract is proposed between factors, or between a factor and any other creditor, to pass property for an antecedent debt, it is not a sale in the legal sense of that word or in any sense in which it is used in reference to the commission which a factor has to sell. ”

“ So a sale upon credit, instead of being for ready money, under a general authority to sell, and in a trade where the usage is to sell for ready money only, creates to contract between the owner and the buyer, and the thing sold may be recovered in an action of trover. ”

“ Justice Story show that the receiving a note as security for a debt, or forbearance to sue a present claim or debt, or an exchange of securities, or becoming a surety, or doing any other act at the request or for the benefit of the maker or indorser, will constitute a sufficient consideration for note as well as the payment of money, or the making of advances, or giving credit, or the discharge of a present debt, or the performance of work or labor at the request of the party. ”

“ His first inquiry is, What is the market-value of the note offered? True, he knows that many of the notes he takes cannot be sold at all; but he also knows that the notes he is willing to take will in the aggregate be guarantied by a reservation of one, two, or three per cent., and that the note of the particular applicant for credit will tend to swell or to diminish the rate; and he cannot afford to exchange his goods for any note, except at a profit which will guaranty its payment when due,—which, in other words, will make the note equal in value to cash. ”