LAW OF SURETYSHIP SELECTED AND ANNOTATED By CLINTON DE WITT, A. B., L. L. B. of the Cleveland Bar Author of Second Edition of Stearns on Suretyship. INDIANAPOLIS PUBLISHERS PREFACE The last decade has witnessed many changes in the law of Suretyship. The Corporate Surety is rapidly replacing the Personal Surety. Business men prefer the promise of a Corporate Surety of recognized solvency to that of the individual of doubtful responsibility. Federal, State and Municipal laws require contractors engaged in the construction of public buildings and improvements to furnish bonds to secure their performance. The amounts involved are such that no one other than the Corporate Surety cares or is able to undertake the risk. Probably more contracts of suretyship have been written in the last ten years than in the century preceding, and of these, approximately seventy-five per cent. have been signed by the Corporate Surety. Chartered for the business of taking risks, preparing its own contract, exacting a premium for its undertaking, the Corporate Surety is not "the favorite of the law" which the Personal Surety is. Defenses and remedies available to the latter are sometimes curtailed or even denied when sought by the former. The consideration shown by the courts to the Personal Surety in the construction and application of his contract is seldom found when the contract of a Corporate Surety is the subject of litigation. It is for the purpose of acquainting the student with this departure from the old principles of the law of Suretyship that the author seeks to justify the publication of this selection of cases. It is not to be understood, however, that the cases selected concern the Corporate Surety only. A very large majority of the cases relate to the contract of the Private Surety. Very little abridgement of the opinions of the court has been made. Statements of facts, where the opinion is sufficiently explanatory, have been omitted, and some have been revised. Árguments of counsel have sometimes been set forth where they are of value in illuminating the processes of reasoning leading up to the decision of the court. Editorial notes and annotations are few, the author believing that professors prefer to make their own references to their classes from more recent current decisions. An acknowledgment is due Professors Ames, Stearns and Henning, from whose books the author has derived much assistance. CLINTON DE WITT. |