Humphrey v. Mayfield

• Citation: 63 Kan. 208,65 P. 234
• Decision Date: 08 June 1901
• Docket Number: 12,333
• Parties: A. L. HUMPHREY v. LEE MAYFIELD
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Kansas

65 P. 234

63 Kan. 208

A. L. HUMPHREY v. LEE MAYFIELD

No. 12,333

Supreme Court of Kansas

June 8, 1901

Decided January, 1901.

Error from Linn district court; WALTER L. SIMONS, judge.

Judgment affirmed.

SYLLABUS

SYLLABUS BY THE COURT.

CHATTEL MORTGAGE--Stock of Merchandise--Invalid. A chattel mortgage on a stock of merchandise, containing stipulations that the mortgagor shall continue in possession and may sell all of the stock, without limitation as to whether it shall be for cash or on credit, and which gives him the option to buy other goods to keep up the stock, without fixing any standard of value or amount to which the stock shall be kept and which provides that the moneys derived from sales, over and above what is necessary for expenses and to keep up the stock, shall be turned over to the mortgagee, is inoperative and void.

Blue & Riggs, and W. R. Biddle, for plaintiff in error.

Snoddy & Snoddy, for defendant in error.

OPINION

JOHNSTON, J.:

This was an action of replevin brought by A. L. Humphrey against Lee Mayfield, as sheriff, to recover a stock of merchandise which the sheriff had seized on executions issued against M. A. Yoakum and Mollie Yoakum. Humphrey's claim to the right of possession was based on a chattel mortgage executed by the Yoakums to Humphrey and which was filed for record. It purported to have been given as security for several promissory notes given by the Yoakums to Humphrey, aggregating $ 800, the first of which became due two years after the mortgage was executed and the last of which matured four years after the execution of the mortgage. The case was tried by the court without a jury, and the agreements as to the facts eliminated all questions from the case except the single question, Was Humphrey's alleged mortgage a lien on the stock of goods? The validity of the lien was challenged upon two grounds--first, that the transactions between the Yoakums and Humphrey, including the mortgage itself, were not bona fide, but were fraudulent as against the creditors of the Yoakums; and another that the mortgage was inoperative and void because of conditions written on its face. Only a general finding was made by the court, and therefore it cannot be determined whether its judgment rests upon one or both of the grounds stated. But we think the case may be disposed of on the single ground that the conditions expressed on its face destroyed its validity.

The instrument was the ordinary form, the greater part of which was printed, but in it there was written, immediately after the description of the mortgaged property, the unusual provision that the Yoakums

"shall have the right to dispose of any and all of said stock and to purchase other goods to keep up said stock; but all moneys derived from the sale of goods over and above what is necessary for running expenses and to keep up said stock shall be turned over to the said A. L. Humphrey, until the said sum of $ 800, with all interest that shall accrue on it, shall be paid in full, and all goods bought to replenish the stock shall be the property of said A. L. Humphrey until the said notes and all interest is paid."

Following the written portion of the mortgage were the usual printed...