HOW A PENNY STAMP COST FIFTY POUNDS.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2361, 11 October 1880, Page 4

HOW A PENNY STAMP COST FIFTY POUNDS.

Under the above heading, a letter appeared in the “ Lyttelton Times ” of Saturday, signed MWey Baird, of the Suffolk. Brewery, Christchurch, which forcibly illustrates the differences that sometimes arise between law and equity, and reveals a case of singular hardship. Mr Baird says : Last February I applied to a Mr Ackerman, at Pleasant Point, for settlement of an account, and in payment he gave me an order on a person named Orton. The order ran thus : “Feb. 21,1880. “Mr R. Orton.—Please pay Baird and Co., the sum of £25 on my account. “( Signed) John Ackerman.” I called Orton in and asked him if he owed the amount. He replied that he did, but could not pay for two or three weeks. I then wrote across the order “ correct ’’ and Orton signed his name to it. No one in the hotel having a penny duty stamp, I brought the order away with the intention of having it stamped at a future time. When it was presented to Orton for payment he was either unwilling or unable to pay it, and upon his failing to pay me, I sued him upon the order in the Resident Magistrate’s Court, Timaru, having previously stamped it. Orton’s solicitor raised the objection that the order should have been stamped when made. The Resident Magistrate gave judgment in our favour, holding that the document might be stamped after execution upon payment of the fine, and Orton appealed. This was on April 14, and yesterdaj r (five and a-half months after) the matter came before the Judge in Banco, who reversed the judgment of the Court below, and allowed the appeal with costs; which simply means that we are defrauded of the £25 due to us (Ackerman having filed, and Orton given a bill of sale over In's effects in the interim), besides being saddled with all the costs and expenses of proceeding to Timaru in the first instance and prosecuting our case there, and now of this appeal. And why ? Because wc did not do an impossibility, viz., affix a penny stamp to the order when no such stamp was obtainable. There is no pretence that any attempt was made to defraud the revenue, as before the order was sued upon it was duly stamped, and the fine was paid. Yet, notwithstanding that an able and experienced Magistrate like Mr Beetham, with the whole evidence before him, gives a judgment in the interests of equity and good conscience, the superior Court, with uothingbut the bare facts relative to the stamping before it, feels constrained to allow the appeal and reverses the previous decision with costs. Why with costs ? No injustice had been done to the appellant; the Magistrate’s decision was founded on facts and evidence ; surely the appellant was lucky enough to get off without paying his just debts without our being mulcted in costs. This may be law, but it is an outrage on justice and common sense. After referring to various clauses in the Stamp Act, Mr Baird concludes as follows. As there appears to be considerable anbiguity in the wording of the Act, and a difficulty in reconciling apparently contradictory sections, I do think that the case should have been dealt with on its merits, and that the Resident Magistrate’s decision should have been upheld. At the same time that I have felt called upon to make these remarks upon the case, I desire also to express the highest respect for and my thorough confidence in his Honor Judge Johnston who heard the case -