Coburn v. Factors' & Traders' Ins. Co.
| Decision Date | 01 April 1884 |
| Citation | 20 F. 644 |
| Parties | COBURN v. FACTORS & TRADERS INS. CO. and others. [1] |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Louisiana |
Richard De Gray, for libelant.
Charles B. Singleton, Richard H. Browne, B. F. Choate, F. T. Nichols and Chas. Carroll, for respondents.
After much deliberation in this case I have concluded that it makes very little, if any, difference whether the respondent companies were stockholders, incorporators, or copartners in the Harbor Protection Company. In either case they were beyond their rights and powers under the scope and effect of their charters as insurance companies, and what they have done has been ultra vires. But the view I take of the case renders it unnecessary to determine the responsibilities devolving on them by reason of their connection with the Harbor Protection Company, but for the case concede them to be as claimed by libelant. Nor is it necessary to consider as to the legal force and effect of the employment of libelant by the Harbor Protection Company, and the several agreements by and between libelant and the same company. Neither the Harbor Protection Company nor the respondents owe the libelant by reason of any salvage services rendered to or for them. The case is that the Protection Company, in the first instance, and the respondent in the second, had received moneys for salvage services, which, in law and in fact belonged to the officers and crew of the tug-boat on which libelant was employed, and a share of which money belonged to him. It may be assumed, and perhaps correctly assumed, that libelant, as master of the tug-boat earning the salvage collected by the Harbor Protection Company owners, was entitled to his share of the same, as claimed in the libel and that he never has legally waived or abandoned his right to sue for and collect the same. As the respondents did not owe libelant this money, they cannot be held liable for it beyond the responsibility devolving on them as copartners or stockholders in the Harbor Protection Company, and that which they incurred when they received the money, or part of it from the Harbor Protection Company. In short, the demand libelant has in this is one for money had and received, either by the Protection Company, for which respondents may be said to be liable, or by the respondents themselves. The case shows that the Harbor Protection Company, owners of the salving tugs, from December, 1871, to March, 1876, received large amounts, say $74,723.48, of salvage, a portion of which belonged to the libelant as master; that whatever was done with the said salvage money by the Protection Company, only the sum of $2,144 thereof was turned over to the Home Insurance Company, and only the sum of $3,863.20 thereof was turned over to the Factors' & Traders' Insurance Company. The case further shows that these sums were turned over in December, 1873, since which time libelant's claims have been exigible; and that while libelant has stood by, pretending no claim, rather renouncing any claim, other persons having claims against these funds on the same account of salvage, have, by suits instituted in the admiralty court from time to time, recovered from respondents as salvage moneys more than the original amounts received by respondents, to-wit, from Home Insurance Company the sum of $2,253.42, and from Factors' & Traders' Insurance Company the sum of $3,939.50.
And this brings me to what I consider as certainly a meritorious defense to the libelant's demand, i.e., staleness of demand. The sum claimed by libelant was earned...
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