Hanish v. Kennedy

• Decision Date: 27 September 1895
• Citation: 106 Mich. 455,64 N.W. 459
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court
• Parties: HANISH v. KENNEDY ET AL.

64 N.W. 459

106 Mich. 455

HANISH v. KENNEDY ET AL.

Supreme Court of Michigan

September 27, 1895

Error to circuit court, Kent county; William E. Grove, Judge.

Action by Anthony Hanish against Robert J. Kennedy and another on promissory notes. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendants bring error. Affirmed.

Wolcott & Ward, for appellants.

Reuben Hatch and A. W. Johnston, for appellee.

HOOKER J.

The plaintiff recovered a judgment against Robert and James Kennedy. The latter appealed. The findings of fact show that the court found that the defendants gave their joint and several promissory notes to certain banks, and that the plaintiff was an accommodation indorser, and was obliged to pay the same; also, that defendants gave other similar notes to the plaintiff; and that both defendants were sober when the notes were given. Upon these findings judgment was rendered for the plaintiff.

Subsequently the findings were amended, and made to show that at the time that the several notes were indorsed and taken by the plaintiff he knew that the defendant James Kennedy signed them as surety for his son, the other defendant, and that said notes were all signed by said James Kennedy, with his son as joint maker, and for the express purpose of procuring the indorsement of the plaintiff, who indorsed said notes for the accommodation of both defendants and that both defendants were sober, and mentally competent when said notes were given. As a conclusion of law the court found that both defendants were primarily liable to plaintiff as joint makers of the notes. Exceptions were taken to each finding of fact, and to the refusal to find as requested, and to the conclusions of law. The questions which counsel appear to rely upon are: (1) Error upon the part of the court on several findings of fact. (2) His refusal to find that defendant James Kennedy received none of the proceeds of the notes, and that the plaintiff signed them for the accommodation of Robert Kennedy, knowing that James Kennedy was only a surety. (3) That he erred in admitting a date stamped upon one of the notes with a bank stamp as evidence of the time of payment as bearing upon the question of defendant James Kennedy's alleged intoxication. (4) That both James Kennedy and the plaintiff were sureties of Robert Kennedy, and therefore, that plaintiff had not a joint cause of action against the defendants.

1. The first point may be disposed of by the trite statement that we cannot review the findings of the circuit judge upon questions of fact, where there is a conflict in the evidence. We think that such was the case here upon every material proposition covered by the findings.

2. We think that the findings do show that James Kennedy did not receive the proceeds of the notes, inasmuch as it is stated that the plaintiff knew that he was an accommodation maker. They also show clearly that the plaintiff was an...