Taber-prang Art Co. v. Durant
| Decision Date | 11 September 1905 |
| Citation | 189 Mass. 173,75 N.E. 221 |
| Parties | TABER-PRANG ART CO. v. DURANT. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Warren & Garfield and Clement R. Lamson, for appellant.
Wm. P Martin, for appellee.
This is a bill in equity to have the proceeds of certain lands and buildings held by the defendant Durant, as commonlaw assignee of C. L. Jones & Co., and of Frank H. Jones and Henry E. Jones, composing the firm of C L. Jones & Co., distributed amongst the creditors of the partnership. The case was heard upon agreed facts, in addition to facts alleged in the bill and admitted in the answer, with power to the court to draw inferences. There was a decree adjudging that $1,010, the proceeds of a brick storehouse and of a candle factory, were partnership property, and that all the rest of the real estate was property of Frank H. Jones and Henry E. Jones as individuals, and directing that the proceeds thereof should be paid over to their individual creditors. The plaintiff appealed.
We think that the decree should be affirmed. The land and buildings formerly belonged to Charles L. Jones and Henry E Jones as tenants in common, and on the premises they carried on the business of manufacturing soap, candles, etc., under the style of C. L. Jones & Co. There is nothing to show that the land and buildings were firm property or were so regarded. Charles L. Jones died in March 1879, and devised his half of the land and buildings to Frank H. Jones, with one-half of the fixtures, machinery, and apparatus used in the business, and thereafter Henry E. Jones and the said Frank H. Jones carried on the business on the premises as equal partners under the same style as that under which it had been carried on formerly. There is nothing to show that there was any conveyance of the land and buildings by them to themselves as a firm, or that it was agreed or understood that the land and buildings should be regarded as partnership property, and they were not so entered on the books. It is plain that the use of them for partnership purposes did not of itself convert them into partnership assets, or conclusively show an intention to treat them as such. Grubbs' Appeal, 66 Pa. 117; Robinson Bank v. Miller, 153 Ill. 244, 38 N.E. 1078, 27 L. R. A. 449, 46 Am. St. Rep. 883; Frink v. Branch, 16 Conn. 260; Ware v. Owens, 42 Ala. 212, 94 Am. Dec. 672; 1 Lindley on Partn. (2d Am. Ed.) 331; 1 bates on Partn. §§ 286, 287. No rent was paid, and the taxes, insurance, and repairs that were paid by the flrm, with the new floors that were put in and the small additions that were made to the buildings, well...
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