Any right under a contract, either express or implied, which has not been reduced to possession, is a chose in action; (a) and is so called because it can be enforced against an adverse party only by an action at law. At common law, the transfer of such chose in action was entirely forbidden. The reason was said to be this. A chose in action, by its very nature and definition, is a right which cannot be enforced against a reluctant party, except by an action, or suit at law. And if this be transferred, the only thing which passes is a right to go to law; and so much did the ancient law abhor litigation, that such transfers were wholly prohibited. (b) But we apprehend that the * stronger and * 224

(a) 2 Bl. Com. 396, 397; 1 Dane, Abr. 92. Choses in action are not limited, however, to rights arising under contracts. "Blackstone seems to have entertained the opinion, that the term chose, or thing in action, only included debts due, or damages recoverable for the breach of a contract, express or implied. But this definition is too limited. The term chose in action is used in contradistinction to chose in possession. It includes all rights to personal property not in possession which may be enforced by action; and it makes no difference whether the owner has been deprived of his property by the tortious act of another, or by his breach of a contract, express or implied. In both cases, the debt or damages of the owner is a 'thing in action.'" Per Bronson, C. J., Gillet v. Fairchild, 4 Denio, 80. It was accordingly held in that case that a receiver of an insolvent corporation, who was empowered by law to sue for and recover " all the estate, debts, and things in action". belonging to the corporation, might maintain trover for the conversion of the personal property of the corporation before the plaintiff was appointed receiver. See also Hall v. Robinson, 2 Comst. 293.

(b) "It is to be observed, that by the ancient maxim of the common law, a right of entry or a chose in action cannot be granted or transferred to a stranger, and thereby is avoided great oppression, injury, and injustice." Co. Lit. 266 a. So again in Lampet's case, 10 Rep. 48, Lord Coke says; " The great wisdom and policy of the sages and founders of our law have provided, that no possibility, right, title, nor thing in action, shall be granted or assigned to strangers, for that would be the occasion of multiplying of contentions and suits, of great oppression of the people, and chiefly of terre-tenants, and the subversion of the due and equal execution of justice." At what time this doctrine, which, it is said, had relation originally only to landed estates, was first adjudged to be equally applicable to the assignment of a mere personal chattel not in possession, it is not easy to decide; it seems, however, to have been so settled at a very early period of our history, as the works of our oldest text-writers, and the reports contain numberless observations and cases on the subject. Chitty & Hulme on Bills, p. 6. - But it is to be ob-served that the king was always an exception to this rule, for he might always better reason was, that no debtor shall have a new creditor substituted for the original one, without his consent; for he may have substantial reasons for choosing whom he should owe.

Courts of equity have, for a long time, disregarded this rule; (c) and, as a general rule, they permit the assignee of a chose in action to sustain an action in his own name, if he can go into equity at all; but when such a case comes before them, they apply such equitable rules as would prevent the debtor from being oppressed or injured. (d) Such an assignment is regarded either grant or receive a possibility or chose in action by assignment. Brever-ton's case, Dyer, 30 b; Co. Lit. 232 b, n. (1). And it seems that in this country the same exception exists in respect to the government of the United States. United States v. Buford, 3 Pet. 30.

(c) Anon. Freem. Ch. (Miss.) 145; Wright v. Wright, 1 Ves. Sen. 409; Warmstrey v. Tanfield, 1 Chanc. 29; Row v. Dawson, 1 Ves. Sen. 331; Prosser v. Edmonds, 1 Y. & Coll. 481; Hinkle v. Wanzer, 17 How. 353; Bigelowu. Willson, 1 Pick. 485, 493; Dix v. Cobb, 4 Mass. 508, 511; Haskell v. Hilton, 30 Me. 419; Miller v. Whittier, 32 id. 203; Moor v. Veazie, id. 342; Ex parte Foster, 2 Story, 133.

(d) It is not to be understood that the assignee of a chose in action may always enforce his claim in a court of equity; but simply that he may proceed in equity in his own name, whenever he is entitled to go into a court of equity at all. It seems to be well settled, however, that the mere fact of one's being the assignee of a chose in action will not entitle him to go into a court of equity at all. His remedy is generally complete at law by a suit in the name of the assignor, and to that he will be left. It is only when the legal remedy is in some manner obstructed or rendered insufficient that a court of equity will interpose. The law was thus laid down by Lord Hardwicke, in Motteux v. The London Assurance Co. 1 Atk. 545, 547; by Lord King, in Dhegetoft v. The London Assurance Co. Mosely, 83; and by Sir Lancelot Shad well, in Hammond v. Messenger, 9 Sim. 327, 332. In this last case the learned Vice-Chancellor said: " If this case were stripped of all special circumstances, it would be, simply, a bill filed by a plaintiff who had obtained from certain persons to whom a debt was due a right to sue in their names for the debt. It is quite new to me that, in such a simple case as that, this court allows, in the first instance, a bill to be filed against the debtor, by the person who has become the assignee of the debt. I admit that, if special circumstances are stated, and it is represented that notwithstanding the right which the party has obtained to sue in the name of the creditor, the creditor will interfere and prevent the exercise of that right, this court will interpose for the purpose of preventing that species of wrong being done; and, if the creditor will not allow the matter to be tried at law in his name, this court has a jurisdiction, in the first instance, to compel the debtor to pay the debt to the plaintiff; especially in a case where the act done by the creditor is done in collusion with the debtor. If bills of this kind were allowable, it is obvious that they would be pretty frequent; but I never remember any instance of such a bill as this being filed, unaccompanied by special circumstances." See also Keys v. Williams, 3 Y. & Col. 462, 466; Rose v. Clarke, 1 Y. & Col. Ch. 534, 548; James v. Newton, 142 Mass. 366. The doctrine has been distinctly held also in New York: Carter v. United Ins. Co. 1 Johns. Ch. 463; Ontario Bank v. Mumford, 2 Barb. Ch. 596. And in Maryland; Grover v. Christie, 2 Har. & J. 67; Adair v. Winchester, 7 G. & J. 114. And in Tennessee; Smiley v. Bell, Mart. & Y. 378. And in Virginia: Moseley v. Boush, 4 Rand. 392. There is no conflict between the case of Moseley v. Boush and the case of Winn v. Bowles, 6 Munf. 23, an earlier Virginia case. The latter case simply decided that the statute of Virginia, authorizing the assignee of a chose in action to sue in his own name, did not take from the Court of Chancery the jurisdiction which it formerly had. There seems to have been sufficient in this case to give a court of equity jurisdiction consistently with the rule that we have laid down. Mr. Justice Story, indeed, in his Commentaries on Equity Jurisprudence, expresses a somewhat different view upon this subject. After stating the law as laid down in Hammond v. Messenger, cited above, he says, § 1057 a: "This doctrine is apparently