Butler v. Farmers' Nat. Bank of Hamburg
| Decision Date | 22 January 1916 |
| Docket Number | 30265 |
| Citation | 155 N.W. 999,173 Iowa 659 |
| Parties | ANNA L. BUTLER, Appellant, v. FARMERS NATIONAL BANK, Appellee |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Appeal from Fremont District Court.--THOMAS ARTHUR, Judge.
ACTION on an alleged deposit resulted in judgment for defendant. The plaintiff appeals.
Reversed.
Tinley Mitchell & Thornell, for appellant.
T. S Stevens, for appellee.
I.
M. J. Butler owned and operated a large farm near Hamburg. Owing to ill health, he went to Excelsior Springs, Missouri, for treatment, leaving his wife, Anna L. Butler, in charge. In paying current expenses, she issued checks on her husband's account, and on June 22, 1910, sold the fat hogs to one Reed, who, in payment thereof, gave her a check, or stock ticket. She deposited this with the Farmers National Bank, succeeded by defendant, and received a slip in language as follows:
Deposited with
FARMERS NATIONAL BANK
Hamburg, Iowa, 6/22 1910.
for account of
MRS. M. J. BUTLER.
Currency
Silver
Gold
698
40
(Sgd) Dupt. W. R. Erwin.
She had had no account with the bank, and nothing seems then to have been said about opening one, and the deposit was entered to her husband's credit in his account. Thereafter, Mrs. Butler checked on this account in payment of his expenses, as before; and when, upon Butler's return, some weeks later, his pass book was balanced, she noticed that the deposit had been credited to him. She testified that she informed the bank, within two weeks after the deposit was made, that it was not Butler's money, but her own. If so, there was money then in the hands of the bank which might have been held for her. The assistant cashier swore that she did not mention the matter until two or three years afterwards, when she demanded payment. The defense to her action to recover the money deposited was that, notwithstanding the language of the deposit slip, the proceeds of the sale of the hogs belonged to M. J. Butler and therefore were rightly entered to his credit and checked out by him. As she previously had no account with the bank and one was not then opened in its books, the question touched in argument, whether a bank may defend a refusal of payment to a depositor by setting up title in another, is not presented. But see Morse on Banking, Sec. 341 et seq; Van Alen v. American Nat. Bank, 52 N.Y. 1; Farmers' & Mechanics' National Bank v. King, 57 Pa. 202; German Bank v. Himstedt, 42 Ark. 62; Viets v. Union Nat. Bank, 101 N.Y. 563 (54 Am. Rep. 743, 5 N.E. 457); Morrill v. Raymond, 28 Kan. 415.
The check or stock ticket was handed to her and, on being deposited, the deposit slip was given to her, reciting the fact of the deposit. Counsel for appellant proceed in argument as though this were a certificate of deposit. Such is not its correct designation. It is a mere acknowledgment that the amount of money named has been received. It contains no promise to pay upon its return, no words of negotiability, and has no use save, possibly, to settle a dispute as to the amount of the deposit. It is merely a receipt, and subject to parol explanations, as receipts generally are. It is not proof of liability of the bank; for, though the amount named may have been deposited, part or all may have been checked out. Hough v. First National Bank of Oelwein, 173 Iowa 48, 155 N.W. 163; First National Bank v. Clark, 134 N.Y. 368 (32 N.E. 38); Daniel's Negotiable Instruments, Sec. 1704.
II. The deposit slip recited that the deposit was for the account of plaintiff; and if the money were hers, the defendant must account to her therefor, unless relieved therefrom by her acquiescence in the payment to her husband and the evidence thereon was in conflict. In her reply, plaintiff admitted that the hogs had belonged to Butler, but alleged that, immediately before going to Excelsior Springs, he told her to sell them and keep the money, and that she might have the money; and in pursuance thereof, she sold the hogs and deposited the proceeds as her own. To questions calling for the conversation at that time, the objection "as immaterial, irrelevant, incompetent under the statute" was sustained, as was a like objection to questions propounded to her daughter. Later, Mrs. Butler was asked what her husband said to her "when he started to the Springs, about those hogs and what was to become of them, and your interest in the hogs". Objection as hearsay, incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial was sustained. Some more questions were asked, and counsel then stated that he ...
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