Chemical Bank v. City Bank of Portage

Citations

• 160 U.S. 646
• 16 S. Ct. 417
• 40 L. Ed. 568
• 1896 U.S. LEXIS 2127

Syllabus

<p>By authority of the directors of a national bank in Chicago, which had acquired some of its own stock, the individual note of its cashier, secured by a pledge of that stock was, through a broker in Portage, sold to a bank there. The note not being paid at maturity the Portage Bank sued the Chicago Bank in assumpsit, declaring specially on the note, which it alleged was made by the bank ib the cashier’s name, and also setting out the common counts. The bank set up that the purchase of its own stock was illegal and that money borrowed to pay a debt contracted for that purpose was equally forbidden by Rev. Stat. § 5201. The trial court was requested by the Chicago Bank to rule several propositions of law, and declined to do so. Judgment was then entered for the Portage Bank. The Supreme Court of the State of Illinois held that the Portage Bank was entitled to recover under the common counts, and that it was not necessary to consider whether the trial court had' ruled correctly on the propositions of law submitted to it. Held, that that court, in rendering such judgment, denied no title, right, privilege, or immunity specially set up or claimed under the laws of the United States, and that the writ of error must be dismissed.</p>