Lehigh Coal & Iron Co. v. Scallen

Citation63 N.W. 245,61 Minn. 63
CourtSupreme Court of Minnesota (US)
Decision Date07 May 1895
PartiesLEHIGH COAL & IRON CO. v. SCALLEN ET AL.

61 Minn. 63
63 N.W. 245

LEHIGH COAL & IRON CO.
v.
SCALLEN ET AL.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

May 7, 1895.


[63 N.W. 245]


(Syllabus by the Court.)

1. When an instrument of guaranty is executed and delivered, not as an offer of guaranty, but as an acceptance of a proposition coming from the guarantee, or contemporaneous with an agreement by the guarantee to accept, no further notice to the guarantor of acceptance by the guarantee is necessary to bind the guarantor.

2. Although a continuing guaranty is unlimited as to the time it shall continue and the amount for which the guarantor shall be liable under it, yet such time and amount must be reasonable under all the circumstances of the case.

3. Under the circumstances of this case, held that the court did not err in holding, as a question of law, that one year after the date of the guaranty was not an unreasonable length of time for the guarantee to continue to give credit on the faith of the guaranty without communicating with the guarantor.

4. The guaranty provides, “I hereby agree to become responsible for any amount of credit you may give him.” Held, this language must be given due weight, but, even under this language, an unreasonable amount of credit might be given, and, where there was evidence tending to show that a reasonable line of credit in the business of the principal debtor was from $300 to $400, it was a question for the jury whether it was unreasonable on the faith of this guaranty to extend to him a line of credit amounting to over $1,300.

5. Compliance with the amendment made at the last term to rule 9 of this court, requiring the paper book and briefs to be filed three days before the day of argument, cannot be dispensed with by the stipulation of the parties; and the prevailing party failing to comply with the same cannot recover statutory costs.


Appeal from district court, Hennepin county; Seagrave Smith, Judge.

Action by the Lehigh Coal & Iron Company, a corporation, against E. F. Scallen and another. Judgment was ordered for plaintiff, and a new trial denied. Defendants appeal. Reversed.

Jacob H. Cook, Freeman P. Lane, and William H. Briggs, for appellants.

J.B. Phelps, for respondent.


CANTY, J.

The defendant E. F. Scallen was in the retail fuel business. The plaintiff corporation was in the wholesale fuel business. He desired to purchase wood and coal of it on credit, and procured his brother, J. C. Scallen, to make and deliver to plaintiff, at the time of its date, the following guaranty...

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