Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 10.djvu/160

134 134 HARVARD LAW REVIEW. pears that it is clearly not unconscientious for him to retain it, there should be no recovery. Statute of Limitations — Oral Promise to Waive. — An enactment provides that, to take a debt out of the Statute of Limitations, an acknowledgment of indebted- ness or promise to pay must be in writing. A debtor, being pressed for payment, agrees orally with his creditor, just before the debt is outlawed, that he will waive the defence of the statutory bar in consideration of the latter's forbearance to sue for a cer- tain time. The creditor does forbear for the time requested, and afterwards brings suit. Held, the debtor cannot set up the Statute of Limitations as a defence. Bridges V. Stephens, 34 S. W. Rep. 555 (Mo.). Express statutes, similar to the above, requiring written evidence of a new promise to pay by a debtor in order to bind him, have been adopted in many of the States. Such provisions might at first seem to cover the facts of the present case, and to ren- der the oral agreement invalid. But a distinction is to be made between two different kinds of promise. First, there are those which have nothing but the past consideration of an old debt to support them. It was at these that the statute requiring writing was evidently aimed. Promises of the other class have a new and valid consideration, and therefore form part of a com])lete contract. This was the case in Bridges v. Stephens. The consideration was the forbearance of the creditor, and there was in all respects a perfect second contract, which might have been declared on in a separate action. East India Co. v. Fatd, 7 Moo. P. C. C. 85, 112. It was not for such an agreement that the statute was intended, but only for a bare promise. This seems to be the true ratio de- cidendi in the case. The theory of estoppel put forward by the court is hardly tenable, for there was no misrepresentation by the debtor as to an existing fact, but simply a promise for the future. Torts — Deceit — Liability for Misrepresentations in Prospectus. — Where a person has issued the prospectus of a company containing a representation known at the time to be false, and subsequently causes to be published a false representation to the same effect as that of the prospectus, with the intent of inducing persons to pur- chase shares of the company in the open market. Held, he is responsible for the con- sequences of so doing to any one who, having received a prospectus, purchases shares after allotment on the faith of false representations so published. Andrews v. Mockford, [1896], I Q. K. 372. This decision correctly distinguishes Peek v. Gurney, L. R. 6 H. L. 377, where it was held that the function of the prospectus in that particular case was exhausted with the allotment. The mailing of the prospectus and subsequent publishing of false infor- mation are treated as one continuous fraud. See Barry v. Croskey, 2 J. & H. i. Torts — Libel — Privileged Occasion — Statute of Limitations. — Hehh that in an action for libel based on matter in the pleadings of a former suit, brought by the defendant in the libel suit against the plaintiff, the Statute of Limitations did not begin to run until the determination of the former suit in favor of the defendant therein, since otherwise two courts at once might be trying the same issues of fact. Pardee, J., dissenting. Afasterson v. Brown, 72 Fed. Rep. 136. This is a most surprising case. In the first place, it runs counter to a rule well settled in the law of libel, that words used in judicial proceedings, relevant to the issue, are absolutely privileged. Odgers, Slander and I^ibel, 187, 191 ; Torrey v. Field, o Vt. 353, zfi4; Latvson v. Hicks, 38 Ala. 279. The court's decision on this point is based on White v. Nichols, 3 How. 266, but an examination of that case will show that the remarks relied on are dicta, the case having arisen on libellous matter in a petition to the President for the removal of an official. Such an occasion is no doubt one of qualified privilege. Odgers, Slander and Libel, 226. In the second place, whether or not express malice is a good reply to a plea of the privilege of judicial proceedings, the cause of action is certainly complete at the publication. It is submitted, therefore, that, although a postponement of the libel suit may be desirable, it is at least an inartistic way of effecting it, to say that the cause of action does not accrue until the earlier case comes to judgment. Trusts — Purchaser for Value — Pre-existing Debt. — One Price, having a claim against The Elmbank for salvage, made a partial assignment of his claim to the extent of $1,500 to Cofran, and later another partial assignment of the claim to the amount of $3,200 to Newman. The assignment to Newman was to secure a i^re-exist- ing debt; no agreement was made that the assignment was taken as conditional pay- ment, or that the debtor should be given time. The salvage having been paid into court, Newman, the second assignee, was the first to give notice to the holder of the fund. The fund was not sufficient to pay both Newman and Cofran in full. Held, that