Rawlings v. Robson
| Decision Date | 17 April 1883 |
| Citation | 70 Ga. 595 |
| Parties | RAWLINGS v. ROBSON. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
February Term, 1883.
1. Where one signs a note with his own name, and nothing appears upon its face to show that he is acting for another, he will be held liable; and so also where one signs for another, for whom he has no legal authority, as where he adds to his own name the word administrator, executor, guardian, or merely agent, the obligation is held to be a personal one. Where such principal is distinctly indicated, and the contract is substantially in his or her name, the principal, and not the agent, will be liable, if the agent has the right to bind the principal, but the particular form in which the principal is indicated to immaterial.
( a. ) Therefore if a husband signed a note, " J A. Robson, agent for his wife," such signature sufficiently indicated that the debt was that of the wife and that the husband was her agent; and the failure upon her part to plead non est factum may well be construed into an implied admission of his authority to make it. And parol evidence was admissible to show who the wife was.
2. Where a husband contracted a debt on behalf of his wife, and gave a note therefor signed by himself as her agent, such note was not payment of the debt, in the absence of any express agreement to so receive it.
Principal and Agent. Husband and Wife. Contracts. Promissory Notes. Payment. Before Judge CARSWELL. Washington Superior Court. September Term, 1882.
Reported in the decision.
HINES & ROGERS, for plaintiff in error.
E. S LANGMADE, for defendant.
This suit was brought against Georgia Robson, the defendant, to recover of her $360, for six tons of commercial guano. She was sued upon a note given therefor, which was signed " J. A. Robson, agent for wife," and also upon account for guano for the same amount called for by the note.
When the case was called for trial, the court, on motion of defendant's counsel, dismissed it upon the grounds:
(1.) Because the note sued upon was the note of J. A. Robson, and not that of his wife, Georgia Robson.
(2.) Because the account sued upon was settled by the note, and could not be sued upon.
We think that the court erred in dismissing the suit, on both grounds.
1. Where one signs a note with his own name, and nothing appears upon its face to show that he is acting for another, he will be held personally liable. And so, too, where one signs for another for whom he has no legal authority, as where he adds to his own name the word administrator, executor, guardian or where he simply adds the word agent, the obligation is held to be a personal one. But in this case whilst J. A Robson signs his own, instead of his wife's name, it is clear that the...
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Jordan v. Brown
...addition to his signature of " " administrator of Geo. O. Dawson," sufficiently indicates that it was the debt of the estate ( Rawlings vs. Robson, 70 Ga. 595), and that plaintiff in error so treated it. At all events, this was a fact from which, with other circumstances, a jury would have ......