Moore v. Land Title & Trust Co.

• Decision Date: 08 January 1896
• Citation: 33 A. 641,82 Md. 288
• Parties: MOORE v. LAND TITLE & TRUST CO. ET AL.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

33 A. 641

82 Md. 288

MOORE v. LAND TITLE & TRUST CO. ET AL.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

January 8, 1896

Appeal from superior court of Baltimore city.

Action by William T. Moore against the Supreme Lodge of the Order of Tonti. From an order striking out the judgment for plaintiff and quashing an attachment, made upon the motion of the Land Title & Trust Company and Francis Shunk Brown, assignees of said order, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Argued before ROBINSON, C.J., and BRYAN, BRISCOE, McSHERRY, FOWLER ROBERTS, PAGE, and BOYD, JJ.

Joseph C. Boyd, for appellant.

J. V L. Findlay and Thomas Mackenzie, for appellees.

BRISCOE J.

On May 18, 1894, the Supreme Lodge of the Order of Tonti, a corporation created under the laws of the state of Pennsylvania, executed a general assignment of all its property, real and personal, to the Land Title & Trust Company and Francis Shunk Brown, of Philadelphia, in trust for the equal benefit of all its creditors. It is agreed by the record that this deed is valid under the law of Pennsylvania governing assignments, and that the trustees named filed an approved bond for the performance of the trust. On the same day that the deed was executed and recorded in Philadelphia a duplicate was filed for record in the clerk's office of the superior court of Baltimore city, but the trustees have filed no bond in this state. On June 1, 1894, the appellant, William T. Moore, sued out of the superior court an attachment against the Order of Tonti as a nonresident debtor, alleging an indebtedness to the plaintiff of the sum of $1,000. The writ was laid in the hands of the National Bank of Commerce as garnishee, and on June 22d of the same year a confession of assets was filed, stating that on June 1, 1894, the Supreme Lodge of the Order of Tonti had to its credit on the books of the bank the sum of $14,231.75. And thereupon a judgment was entered for amount of the plaintiff's claim. Shortly afterwards the appellees moved the court to strike out the judgment and to quash the attachment, and from the order striking out the judgment and quashing the attachment this appeal has been taken.

We have, then, the case of a general assignment for the equal benefit of creditors, executed by a resident of another state and valid under the laws of that state, and valid at common law, which conveys debts and choses in action belonging to the assignor and situate in Maryland. And the appellant contends that this assignment, although recorded in this state, did not operate to convey title to the trustees, so as to defeat his attachment, because the statute of this state (Code, art. 16, § 205), requiring trustees for the benefit of creditors to file an approved bond, was not complied with. Now, there can be no doubt that each state has the right to regulate the transfer of personal property (and here we are dealing with personalty alone), owned by nonresidents but situate within its limits, and it is held that, although a foreign contract or assignment may be valid in the state where made, it will not be enforced in another, if repugnant to the law or policy of the latter state. Railroad Co. v Glenn, 28 Md. 287; Townsend v. Coxe, 151 Ill. 62, 37 N.E. 689. But the general rule is that the validity of a transfer of personal property is governed by the law of the domicile of the owner, according to the maxim, "Mobilia sequuntur personam." And this rule is applicable to voluntary general assignments for the benefit of creditors. Black v. Zacharie, 3 How. 514; Barth v. Backus, 140 N.Y. 230, 35 N.E. 425. The effect thus given to foreign assignment of personal property is based upon interstate comity. Smith's Appeal, 104 Pa. St. 381. There is quite a conflict or variety in the decisions of the states as to the effect to be given to foreign assignments for the benefit of creditors when they contain preferences valid by the law of the state where the assignor is domiciled, but invalid under the law of the forum where property of the assignor is situated, and whose citizens are creditors of the assignor. This question, however, does not arise in this case, since the assignment here is for the equal benefit of all the creditors of the assignor, and is valid in this respect under the laws of Maryland, as well as under the law of Pennsylvania. The question, then, for us to consider is whether Code, art. 16, § 205, applies to an assignment executed in another state by a party there domiciled. The statute provides that every trustee, to whom any estate, real or personal, shall be conveyed for the benefit of creditors, shall file with the clerk of the court in which the deed may be recorded a bond, conditioned for the faithful performance of the trust, and no title shall pass to any trustee until such bond shall be filed and approved. And in the cases of Stiefel v. Barton, 73 Md. 410, 21 A. 63, and Deposit Co. v. Haines, 78 Md. 454, 28 A. 393, this court held that the filing of the bond and its approval by the clerk of the court, was a condition precedent...