State v. Guenther
| Decision Date | 01 May 1894 |
| Citation | 87 Wis. 673,58 N.W. 1105 |
| Parties | STATE v. GUENTHER ET AL. |
| Court | Wisconsin Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from circuit court, Dane county; Robert G. Siebecker, Judge.
Action by the state of Wisconsin against Richard Guenther and others. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendants appeal. Affirmed.
The action is against Richard Guenther, a former state treasurer, and the sureties upon his official bond, to recover moneys which he had received, and had not paid over to his successor in office, as interest on state funds loaned by him to various banks. The judgment is against the defendants for the sum of the interest so received by the treasurer, with interest thereon from the first Monday of January, 1878, when his term of office expired, to the 1st day of April, 1893, at the rate of 7 per cent. per annum, and from the 1st day of April, 1893, to the date of the entry of judgment, at the rate of 6 per cent. per annum. This computation of interest is the error assigned. The legal rate of interest, down to April 1, 1893, was 7 per cent. per annum. Then it was changed to 6 per cent. per annum by statute.
*1106Thompsons, Harshaw & Davidson, for appellants.
J. L. O'Connor and R. M. Bashford, for the State.
NEWMAN, J. (after stating the facts).
On a contract which stipulates for interest, interest at the agreed rate, or, in the absence of an agreed rate, at the rate prescribed by the law at the date of the contract, will be the rate recoverable until the repayment of the principal sum. Spencer v. Maxfield, 16 Wis. 178. A change of the legal rate would not affect the rate of interest recoverable upon such a contract. But where the contract is silent upon the subject of interest, and in many cases of torts, a different rule obtains. There damages, rather than interest, are to be admeasured. In awarding damages, the law aims at indemnity. The purpose is to indemnify the plaintiff for the loss which he has suffered by reason of the defendant's failure to pay the money when it became due. The law assumes, for want of a more certain datum, that interest at the legal rate, during the period through which the money has been withheld, is a fair measure of such loss; for, if the money had come to hand, it is fair to presume it would have produced that rate. But when a change of the legal rate of interest has been made during the period of the default, it is manifest that neither the rate in force at the time of the happening of the default nor the new rate in...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Wyoming National Bank v. Brown
...471; Ellis v. Barlow, 26 S.W. 908; Ry. Co. v. Humphres, 23 id., 556; Ry. Co. v. Grey, 24 id., 921; Ry. Co. v. Cross, 23 id., 529; State v. Guenther, 87 Wis. 675; 90 N.Y. 644; id., 641; 95 id., 641; 96 id., 667; 146 U.S. 162.) In an examination of the decisions from some States, Texas, Kansa......
-
Indian Ref. Co. v. Taylor, 24392.
...the legal rate must govern. O'Brien v. Young, 95 N. Y. 428, 47 Am. Rep. 64;Sanders v. Lake Shore Ry. Co., 94 N. Y. 641;State v. Guenther, 87 Wis. 673, 58 N. W. 1105. In United States v. Mex. Internation R. R. Co. (C. C.) 154 Fed. 519, it is held that interest is recoverable by the United St......
-
Seton v. Hoyt
...to determine such loss, in the absence of any other method of arriving at the exact or precise loss actually incurred. State v. Guenther, 87 Wis. 673, 58 N.W. 1105; v. Cobb, 31 N.J.Eq. 91; White v. Lyons, 42 Cal. 279; Mayor, etc., v. O'Callaghan, 41 N.J.Law, 349. Where there is an agreement......
-
Indian Refining Company v. Taylor
...to pay but simply as damages because of default in the discharge of an obligation, the legal rate of interest must govern. In State v. Guenther, supra, it held that a state treasurer who had failed to pay over moneys due the state to his successor in office is chargeable with interest there......