Cleveland v. Mcnabb

312 F. Supp. 155 (1970)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Ps entered into a written lease with D for a period of five years. D would pay annual rental amounting to fifty dollars per acre for all acreage allotted to cotton by the government and ten dollars per acre for all acreage actually planted in soybeans. Ps sue D for rent allegedly due and owing from the 1968 crop year. Ps also sued TFC Marketing Service, Inc., John S. Wilder, and W.W. Wilder, individually and as partners doing business as Longtown Supply Company, the Commodity Credit Corporation and the United States of America to enforce landlord's liens for the value of purchased crops to the extent that such liens are necessary to satisfy any unpaid rent. By the terms of the written lease, D is liable to Ps for rent in the amount of $23,812.00. Ps rely on the Tennessee Crop Liens Statute, T.C.A. §§ 64-1201 to 64-1214. Under 64-1201 A landlord has a lien on all crops grown on the land during the year for the payment of the rent for the year, whether the contract of rental be verbal or in writing, and this lien shall inure to the benefit of the assignee of the lienor. Under 64-1207 a purchaser, with or without notice, of a crop subject to any of such liens shall be liable to the lienholder for the value of the crop, or any part of it, so purchased, not, however, to exceed the amount of rent due. Under 64-1212 if a tenant, by the consent and permission of his landlord, which consent and permission shall be in writing and signed by such landlord, sell his crop or any part thereof to any purchaser, upon which there exists a lien in favor of the landlord for either rent or supplies of any kind, the purchaser shall pay the purchase price for such crop to the tenant and his landlord jointly, or the purchaser shall issue the check or other written instrument given in lieu of the money for such crop, payable to the landlord and tenant jointly, and before such check or other written instrument shall be cashed or paid, it shall have written or indorsed on the back thereof the genuine signature of the landlord in his own handwriting, or the handwriting of his duly authorized agent or attorney. The Whaley casebook addresses the cotton. It is next contended by the United States (D) that Ps are not entitled to a lien upon crops purchased by the Commodity Credit Corporation because the Commodity Credit Corporation was a good faith purchaser for value of negotiable warehouse receipts.