Conway v. Log Cabin Permanent Building Ass'n

Brent, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an action of assumpsit, brought by the appellant upon a promise of the appellee to loan him $1022. The appellant became a member of the defendant Association in December, 1875, and on the evening of his admission applied for a loan of the above sum of money. This was afterwards agreed to he loaned to him upon the security of a mortgage on certain real property in Baltimore County, if the counsellor of the Association, Mr. H. Edgar Johnson, should report favorably upon the title.

The mortgage was accordingly executed and taken by Mr. Johnson with the assent of the appellant to Towsontown, in Baltimore County, where he went for the purpose of ascertaining the title of the appellant by an examination of the records. He found the title unsatisfactory, ¹³⁸ and so reported to the Association. The mortgage however was left in the clerk’s office and there placed upon the records. Time was given to the appellant to remove the cloud upon the title, which was not done to the satisfaction of the appellee’s solicitor, and the money agreed to he loaned was never paid over to the appellant.

And hence the cause of this action. The case has heen argued at great length, a number of questions presented and a great many authorities cited. We think the appellant has failed to show any sufficient cause of action. The attempt to recover by an action of assumpsit a sum of money promised to he loaned is to us a novel one, and we have heen referred to no case in which such an action has heen maintained.

We are satisfied, from the known learning and ability of the counsel who represented the appellant in the argument, if any such case exists, it would have heen cited. We have failed to see any principle upon which an action like this can he supported. The appellant is not entitled to the money claimed, as his absolutely—his only claim to it, to say the most, is solely as a temporary loan. How and in what form could a judgment he entered so as properly to limit the time, for which the money sought to he recovered is to be held by the plaintiff?

The judgment could only he for a sum of money certain, and would finally settle and determine that