Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/638

 EBEQELO V. ADAHS. 631 �te, no effect upon the property of the defendant until it was delivered to the hands of the sheriff, because it is only from that time it becomes a lien upon personal property. And, if it is not so, how long may an execution, when issued, lie in the clerk's office, or in the hands of the plaintiff or his counr sel, before it is delivered to the sheriff, in order that the lien flhall be continued ? If it may remain there a day, why not a ■week, or a month, or an indefinite time ? Is it a mere matter of discretion how long it shall be before the execution shall be delivered to the officer in order to continue a lien by virtue ■of a first execution ? Is it not much simpler and clearer, and more in accordance with the intent of the law-makers, to say that an execution, if there has been no levy made, which is issued secondly, only operates, as the first did, from the time it cornes to the hands of the officer ? The law makes no dis- tinction between au alms and an original execution. It does not say that the first shall be placed in the hands of an offi- cer in order to make a lien, and the second shall not be. It says, in effect, ail executions, in order to be binding upon personal property, shall be placed in the hands of the officer. And it requires, as to the second execution, the same as the first, that the officer shall indorse upon it the year, the month^ the day, and the hour when he received it. �But it is said that it would have made no difference if the execution had been delivered to the officer on the sixteenth of April, instead of on the seventeenth. That may be true. It only foUows as a necessary consequence, from what has been said, that, where there is nO le^yas to personal property, the lien which the first execution created oeases when it is returned ; and in order that there shall be a lien through an- other execution, it must be delivered to the officer. �As I have said, this is a nice question. The authorities do not agree upon ail of the questions which have a bearing upon this one before the court. I decide it upon what I consider the true construction of the law of Indiana, whiôh, I think, îs binding upon the court in this case. And, in this respect, I differ from the district court, and the order which was made giving priority to the English execution will be reversed. ����