Ricker Nat. Bank v. Stone

• Decision Date: 08 September 1908
• Docket Number: Case Number: 691 Ind Ter T
• Citation: 1908 OK 158,97 P. 577,21 Okla. 833
• Parties: RICKER NAT. BANK v. STONE.
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

1908 OK 158

97 P. 577

21 Okla. 833

RICKER NAT. BANK v. STONE.

Case Number: 691 Ind Ter T

Supreme Court of Oklahoma

Decided: September 8, 1908

Syllabus

¶0 1. PRINCIPAL AND AGENT--Authority--Question for Jury. The apparent authority of an agent is to be gathered from all the facts and circumstances in evidence, and is a question of fact for the jury.

2. BANKS AND BANKING--National Banks--Authority of Agents. A national bank has power under the banking laws of the United States, to intrust to its agents such authority as is required to meet all the legitimate demands of its authorized business and to conduct its affairs within the scope of its charter safely and prudently.

3. PRINCIPAL AND AGENT--Authority of Agent--General Scope. Authority, whether general or special, conferred upon an agent, is to be construed as including only the usual means appropriate to the end. Even if a general discretion is vested in an agent, it is not deemed to be unlimited. It must be exercised in a reasonable manner, and cannot be resorted to to justify acts which the principal could not be presumed to intend.

Appeal from the United States Court for the Southern District of the Indian Territory, Sitting at Chickasha; J. T. Dickerson, Judge.

Action by R. E. Stone against the Ricker National Bank. Judgment for plaintiff. Defendant appeals. Modified.

Charles M. Fechheimer and Gilmore & Brown, for appellant.

Gilbert & Bond, for appellee.

KANE, J.

¶1 This was an action commenced by the appellee, plaintiff below, against the Ricker National Bank, the appellant, defendant below, to recover a certain sum of money which the plaintiff alleged was due him from the defendant on account of personal services rendered. It seems that during the year 1900 and thereafter the defendant employed one G. M. Smith to solicit loans for it at the stockyards at Kansas City, Mo.; that said Smith also kept a general oversight of its loans on cattle, with a view to the preservation of the security and the protection of the interests of the bank. During the year 1900 Maxwell & Morris and Blanton & Morris were engaged in the cattle business in the Chickasaw Nation, Indian Territory, and borrowed from the defendant large sums of money, which were secured by chattel mortgages on cattle located in the Indian Territory. In the latter part of the year 1902 the defendant became uneasy about the condition of their security, and placed the same for investigation and action in the hands of their agent, G. M. Smith; the defendant being informed that Maxwell & Morris and Blanton & Morris were not in a condition financially to procure feed and care for the cattle during the winter months of 1902-03, and that mortgages subsequent to theirs had been executed in favor of parties at Kansas City, making it impossible to take additional security or new mortgages without making them subsequent and inferior to the mortgages held by the Kansas City parties. In order to get means to winter the cattle covered by their first mortgage, negotiations were entered into between Maxwell & Morris and Blanton & Morris and the defendant, which resulted in an agreement on the part of the defendant to loan Maxwell & Morris and Blanton & Morris about $ 20,000, to be used in caring for the cattle during the winter. Maxwell & Morris and Blanton & Morris accordingly executed their notes to appellant for about $ 20,000 and secured the same by mortgages on their cattle.

¶2 It appears from the evidence that there were other cattle than those covered by the mortgages mixed with the cattle upon which the appellant held their mortgages, from which it was necessary for the appellant to protect the feed for which they were paying. In order to be assured that the funds so to be advanced by appellant were applied in caring for the cattle covered by appellant's mortgages, G. M. Smith sent J. M. Edelen to the Indian Territory, to remain with the cattle and to see that the funds advanced were properly applied. Later said Smith recalled said Edelen and sent one Daniel Callahan to the Indian Territory to take his place. The funds were held by G. M. Smith, and, when it was necessary to have money for the purpose of buying feed or making other provisions for the care of said mortgaged cattle, Blanton & Morris or Maxwell & Morris would make a draft on G. M. Smith at Kansas City for the amount of money then required, and submit this draft to Edelen or Callahan, with statement of the purposes to which the money was to be applied, and Edelen or Callahan would O. K. the draft, and it would be forwarded to Kansas City for collection and paid by Smith out of the $ 20,000 loan. The evidence also shows: That appellee had been in charge of the cattle, about 5,000 head, in which the appellant held something over $ 100,000 interest, since October, 1900, or three years prior to the institution of this suit. That he was foreman, and had control of and was familiar with the cattle, their location, etc. When Edelen went to the Indian Territory in November, 1902, the appellee was still so employed. At that time, about the 15th or 20th of November, 1902, Edelen requested appellee to remain and work with the cattle covered by appellant's mortgages, and according to his complaint he began work under his contract with Edelen on the goth day of November, 1902. That, in order to procure his services as foreman of the ranch on which the cattle were located, the appellant, through its agents, Edelen and Smith, bargained with the appellee that they would pay him all back wages then due him from Maxwell & Morris and Morris & Blanton, the amount of which at that time was unascertained, but which the appellee stated was a big amount, and would pay him from that time on until such time as the cattle should be disposed of the sum of $ 50 per month and all expenses. That he earned after commencing his employment the sum of $ 625.

¶3 The defendant denied its liability, and on the issues thus joined the case was tried before a jury, and a verdict was returned in favor of the plaintiff in the sum of $ 1,250. The court ordered a remittitur of $ 150 from the verdict, which remittitur was entered by the plaintiff, and a judgment rendered for the sum of $ 1,100. From this judgment the appellant appealed to the Court of Appeals of the Indian Territory, and the case was transferred to this court under the terms of the Enabling Act and the Schedule to the Constitution.

¶4 The appellant's specification of error contains eight assignments; but, as counsel confined his argument to two of these, we do not deem it necessary to notice the others. Counsel for appellant, in his brief, states his position as follows:

"The appellant, not waiving its other specifications of error, desires to address its argument for a reversal of this cause chiefly to two propositions: First. The court erred in refusing to give the peremptory charge requested by the appellant. Second. If this court shall be of opinion that the appellant's request for a peremptory charge was properly refused, nevertheless the judgment is excessive by at least the sum of $ 625, and to that extent at least is not supported by the evidence and is contrary to law. As shown in the opening statement, the quotations from the appellee's petition, and from his testimony, the $ 1,100 at which the judgment now stands is made up of two items: First, of $ 625 claimed to have been earned by the appellee as an employe of Maxwell & Morris before he entered into the pretended contract with Edelen; and, second, of the sum of $ 475 claimed to have been earned by the appellee while he was working under the pretended contract with Edelen."

¶5 On the first proposition the question of the agency of Edelen and Callahan was submitted to the jury, and, as there was some evidence to show that their authority was broad enough to empower them to employ men for the purpose of taking care of the defendant's interest in the mortgaged property, that question must be deemed to be settled. "The apparent authority of the agent is to be gathered from all the facts and circumstances in evidence, and is a question of fact for the jury." 1 Am. & Eng. Enc. of L. (2d Ed.) 990; Nicholson v. Golden, 27 Mo. App. 132. That a national bank has power under the banking laws of the United States to intrust to its agent such authority as is required to meet all of the legitimate demands of its authorized business, and to enable it to conduct its affairs within the general scope of its charter safely and prudently, is settled by a long line of well-considered decisions. Mr. Chief Justice Waite in First National. Bank of Charlotte v. National Exchange Bank of Baltimore, 92 U.S. 122, 23 L. Ed. 679, in construing the powers of national banks under the national banking laws of the United States (Act June 3, 1864, c. 106, 13 Stat. 99), says:

"Authority is thus given to transact such a banking business as is specified, and all incidental powers necessary to carry it on are granted. These powers are such as are required to meet all the legitimate demands; of the authorized business, and to enable a bank to conduct its affairs within the general scope of its charter safely and prudently. This necessarily implies the right of a bank to incur liabilities in the regular course of its business, as well as to become the creditor of others. Its own obligations must be met, and debts due to it collected or secured."

¶6 To our mind that part of the contract made by the agent of the bank employing the appellee to protect the cattle held as security at a stipulated wage per month was entirely within the scope of his authority, and such power was safely and prudently exercised. The appellee, therefore, was justly entitled to compensation for his service at the rate of $ 50 per month for the time he was employed.

¶7 On the second proposition we see no room for the application of the above principal. The circumstances of his employ-merit are stated by the appellee in...