Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/901

 89e FBDBBAL BBPOBTEE. �asserit. This is the purport of the English (lecisîona, and the rule might be the same here if a single crediter could put the debtor into bankruptcy. In re Cawkwell, 19 Ves. 232; Bam- ford V. Baron, 2 T. E. 594, (a) note ; Hicks v. Burfttt, 4 Campb. 235 ; Ex parte Kilner, Buck's Cases in Bankruptcy, 105. But ■where the crediter cannot, by any action of bis own, repudiate, dissent from, or undo the act of the debtor, his taking of a dividend under the assignaient cannot be deemed such an assent to it, or ratification of it, that he will be estopped to allege it against the debtor as a ground for ref using his dis- charge. The act done is, as regards the crediter, unlawful and improper; constructively fraudulent, in divertingthe Set- tlement of the insolvent debtor's estate from that mode of administration appointed by law to another mode seleeted by him ; and the appointed consequence of the illegality is the • forfeitare of the right to a discharge if opposed by the cred. itor 80 injured. To hold that the taking of a dividend by the crediter under this unlawful assignment, which he can neither prevent nor undo, estops him from alleging the making of it as a violation of law which ferfeits a discharge, weuld put it in the power of the debtor, designing an act in violation of the rights of his crediter, te compel the crediter to elect either to lese ail benefit of the distribution of his estate, or te lese the right to visit upon him the rightful consequence ef the illegal act. Such a resuit would be as clearly against geod faith and good morals, as it is te allow one whe has assented to an act te allege it against the party deing it, to the disadvantage ef that party, as if it were done without his consent and to his prejudice. �The dictum in Mayer v. Hellman, 91 U. S. 496, 501, to the effect that creditors are deemed te bave acquiesced in preferen- tial or fraudulent transfers made bef ere the limited period prier te the bankruptcy, which is prescribed as the limit of time within which theymust be made to be set aside, has relation enly to the recovery of such preperty by action, and has no bearing on this question, which arises under the ninth sub- division of section 5110 ef the Eevised Statutes. That sub- division ef the section imposes no limit of time within'which ����