DAINGERFIELD NATIONAL BANK
v.
RAGLAND

U.S. | 1901-04-08
No. 200
181 U.S. 45 Supreme Court of the United States (1901) Caution
Also reported at: 45 L. Ed. 738 · 21 S. Ct. 536 · 1901 U.S. LEXIS 1339 · SCDB 1900-142
Cited by 5 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

A national bank loaned money to Ragland under promissory notes that included interest calculated at usurious rates between 1895 and 1896, with Ragland fully repaying the notes by February 1898. The Supreme Court affirmed that Ragland's right to recover double the usurious interest under federal statute began to run from the date the interest was actually paid rather than when it was agreed upon, and since Ragland filed suit less than two years after payment, his claim was timely.


© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.

Opinion of the Court
Mr. Justice White

Mr. Justice White delivered the opinion of the court.

At various times between January 1,1895, and May 22,1896, the defendant in error, G. W. Ragland,' with sureties, executed promissory notes to the Daingerfield National Bank, for various sums of money loaned to said Ragland. The bank was a national banking association doing business in Daingerfield, Morris County, Texas. Each original note embraced not only the amount.of the loan but interest to the date of maturity of the note, calculated at a rate higher than that allowed by law. Certain of the notes were renewed from time to time, the additional interest for the extended period being added, calculated also at a usurious rate. The first payment made upon any of the notes so executed was on November 1, 1896, and all the notes were fully paid prior to February 14, 1898.

On March 28, 1898, Eagland filed a petition in the district court of Morris County, Texas, to recover twice the amount of the interest so as aforesaid paid by him, basing his right to recover upon the provisions of section 5198 of the Kevised Statutes of the United States. After deducting as an offset the amount of a note executed by Eagland which had been assigned to the bank by the payee thereof, there was found due to Eag-land upon the cause of action stated in his petition the sum of $252.05, and for that amount with interest judgment was entered in favor of Eagland in October, 1898. On appeal to the Court of Civil Appeals the judgment was affirmed, and a motion for rehearing was overruled. 5Í S. "W. Eep. 661. An application made to the Supreme Court of Texas for an allowance of a writ of error was dismissed for want of jurisdiction. Thereafter the Chief Justice of the Court of Civil Appeals allowed a writ of error, and the case is now here for review.

In the assignments of error contained in the record it is conceded by counsel for the plaintiff in error, and the record fully establishes, that the interest, the subject of this controversy, was paid to the plaintiff in error less than two years before Eagland commenced his action. _ The sole contention in this court is that the courts of Texas erroneously held that the limitation of the statute did not begin to run until the usurious interest was paid. That the courts below, however, did not commit error in this regard is shown by Brown v. Marion National Bank, (1898) 169 U. S. 416, where, construing sections 5197 and 5198 of the Eevised Statutes, it was held that the “ usurious transaction,” from the date of which the limitation of the statute begins to run, is the time when the' usurious interest was actually paid, and not the time when it was agreed that it should be paid. This refufes the argument relied on at bar, that the inclusion of the usurious interest as principal in the notes amounted to payment of the interest within the meaning of the statute.

Judgment affirmed.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Cited By

  • Cronkleton v. Hall, 66 F.2d 384 (8th Cir. 1933)
    …est when tendered, show that they will not carry the illegal contract into execution, and thus escape the twofold penalty.” See, also, Brown v. Marion National Bank, 169 U. S. 416, 18 S. Ct. 390, 42 L. Ed. 801; Daingerfield National Bank v. Ragland, 181 U. S. 45, 21 S. Ct. 536, 45 L. Ed. 738; Baker et al. v. Lynchburg Nat. Bank et al., 120 Va. 208, 91 S. E. 157, 161. Payments of interest are not ordinarily “taken” or “received” except in accordance with a rate “reserved” or “charged” in the original contra…

Authorities Cited

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw