Opinion · Supreme Court of North Carolina

Picot v. . Sanderson

12 N.C. 309

Type
Opinion
Court
Supreme Court of North Carolina
Jurisdiction
North Carolina
Date
1827-12-05
Topic
general

How later courts describe this case

  • explaining that a transaction was “a mere contract or agreement to give, which, being without consideration, cannot be enforced”

Citator

UpLaw has not yet analyzed Picot v. . Sanderson. The absence of a flag is not a finding that it is good law.

Cited by
7 opinions
PICOTv. SANDERSON,12 N.C. 309(1827)
PETER O. PICOT, administrator of LUKE LEGGET, v. THOMAS
SANDERSON.
Supreme Court of North Carolina
December Term, 1827.
From Washington.

A delivery is essential to a gift. Where the obligee gives the obligor an order on his agent for the delivery of the bond, which was not obeyed,it was held, that the gift being incomplete, might be revoked, and that resuming the possession and bringing suit was a revocation.
DEBT upon the single bond of the defendant, payable to the plaintiff's intestate. On the trial, beforeMartin, J., the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff, subject to the opinion of the court upon the following facts: After the bond became due the plaintiff's intestate voluntarily, and without consideration, drew an order on his agent, in whose hands the bond was placed for collection, directing him to deliver it up to the defendant. This direction was not obeyed by the agent, who, upon the obligee's death, handed it to the plaintiff, by whom this action was brought.
His Honor, thinking that these facts formed no bar to the action, judgment was entered for the plaintiff, from which the defendant appealed.
Devereux for the defendant.No counsel for the plaintiff.Page 196
HENDERSON, J.
The order for the delivery of the bond is clearly not good as a payment or satisfaction of the debt. It resembles more the gift of the bond itself; but this it cannot be, for want of a delivery, which is essential to a gift. Without a delivery, the transaction is a mere contract or agreement to give, which, being without consideration, cannot be enforced. If the person on whom the order was drawn had delivered the bond, in pursuance of the order, before it was countermanded, the gift would have been complete. But the owner, or (310) his representative, might countermand it, which was done in the present case.

The only authority I have seen which in any measure supports a gift without delivery is taken from Brooke's Abridg., Trespass, pl., 303. There it is said, if A, in London, the owner of goods which are in York, give them to B, and before B has obtained the actual possession a stranger take them, B may maintain trespass for them. If this be law, it is on the ground that the action is brought against a stranger, without any revocation on the part of the donor.

The executor, by resuming the actual possession and bringing the present action, has clearly revoked the gift.Withers v. Lys, 3 Ser. Low., 9.

PER CURIAM. Judgment affirmed.Approved: Adams v. Hayes,24 N.C. 361;Medlock v. Powell,96 N.C. 499.