Healy v. Wayne Title & Trust Co.

Citations

• 19 Pa. Super. 371
• 1902 Pa. Super. LEXIS 104

Syllabus

<p>Mechanics' liens — Stipulation against liens — Subcontractor.</p> <p>On a scire facias sur mechanic’s lien by a subcontractor, where it appears that a contract executed by the principal contractor, a corporation, and containing a sufficient stipulation against liens had been filed in the prothonotary’s office, the subcontractor cannot be heard to allege that the clause against liens had been written into the contract by an agent of the company without authority from it, and that the copy of the contract had be<?U filed and the work proceeded with, in ignorance on the part of the company, of the insertion of the lien clause.</p> <p>In such a ease the plaintiff is impaled on one of two horns of a dilemma. If his materials were furnished to the building on the faith, and by virtue of the contract as written and filed with the prothonotary, he has no right of lien. If the principal contractor did not proceed with the work under the written contract, then no authority was given to the principal contractor to proceed at all, and no authoi’ity to bind the building by liens could be transmitted to the subcontractor. The principal contractor, by proceeding with the work either adopted the contract, with its interpolation, or else had no contract.</p>