Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 8.djvu/553

 COK V. CAYUGA LAKB K. CO. 639 �chant, and bills of exchange." The general inhibition in the new stat- ute is broader and more general than in the prior one, and the exception covers more ground in the new statute than in the prior one. But the statutory language in the exception cannot be extended by construction. It would have been easy to say negotiable instrument, or negotiable bond or other instrument, or negotiable chose in action, or instru- ment negotiable by the law merchant, or otherwise. The argument on the part of the plaintiff is directed to showing that the instruments in question are negotiable, not that they are» such instruments as the exception in the statute speaks of. It cannot be supposed that con- gress in 1875, with the large experience which had been had at that time in the United States in bonds, obligations, certificates of indebt- edness, and promissory notes, under seal and not under seal, of municipal corporations and private corporations, did not understand and reCognize, in making such exception, the distinction between a promissory note negotiable by the law merchant, as an instrument well known to the law and to commerce, and to be identified by that description, and other instruments which, though they had become by statute or general usage or judicial decisions to be regarded as in a certain sense negotiable, were not promissory notes negotiable by the law merehant. The obligations of municipalities, payable to bearer, have been placed by numerous decisions of the supreme court of the United States in the category of negotiable instruments transferable by delivery so far as to authorize the holder to demand payment of them, and to maintain, in his own name, an action upon them ; but they do not thereby necessarily become negotiable instru- ments in the sense of the law merchant. Wall v. Monroe Co. Sup. et, U. S. Oct. term, 1880, (2 Morr. Trans. 266.) And even where they have such a status that, passing into the hands of a hona fide purchaser for value before maturity, they do so freed from any infirmity in their origin, {Cromwell v. County of Sac, 96 U. S. 51, 57,) they are not promissory notes negotiable by the law merchant, in the sense of the statute under consideration. Such obligations, payable to bearer, are deemed payable to the holder, and so, under this act of 1875, the holder who sues is not regarded as an assignee of the con- tract, but is a holder through a transfer by delivery. �I am satisued that, on the ground of want of jurisdietion, a verdict for the defendant Morgan ought to have been directed, and that, for that reason, a new trial must be granted. ��� �