UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE

SCHWARTZ V. IRVING TRUST CO., 299 U. S. 456 (1937)

299 U. S. 456

U.S. Supreme Court

Schwartz v. Irving Trust Co., 299 U.S. 456 (1937)

Schwartz v. Irving Trust Co.

No. 436

Argued December 16, 1936

Decided January 4, 1937

299 U.S. 456

Syllabus

1. When claims of a landlord for injury resulting from rejection of the lease by the lessee's trustee in bankruptcy have been unqualifiedly released by him as against the trustee, the bankrupt, and the bankrupt estate, they may not be reasserted in a proceeding under § 77B of the Bankruptcy Act to reorganize the corporation. Pp. 299 U. S. 459, 299 U. S. 461.

2. An agreement between the landlord of a bankrupt corporation, the bankrupt and its trustee in bankruptcy, which, under the local law of landlord and tenant, effects a surrender and termination of the leasehold, does not deprive the landlord of his provable claim in proceedings under § 77B of the Bankruptcy Act for future rent or indemnity. City Bank Farmers Trust Co. v. Irving Trust Co., ante, p. 299 U. S. 433. P. 299 U. S. 461.

3. Agreements executed by landlords of a bankrupt corporation with the lessee and its trustee in bankruptcy which operated (as it is here assumed) to surrender and terminate the leaseholds each contained a clause purporting to release the trustee, the bankrupt estate, and the bankrupt from all liability respecting the lease to which it related, including all claims of the landlord in respect of rent, but contained also a modifying clause declaring that nothing in the release clause should be deemed a waiver by the landlord of the right to prove against the bankrupt estate "any provable claims" clubjuris

Page 299 U. S. 457

to which the bankruptcy court might adjudge him entitled, etc. Held, that the modifications applied in each case not only to the releasing clause, but to the agreement as a whole, and operated to preserve the right to prove claims for future rent, or indemnity for loss of rent, which were not provable in bankruptcy as the law then stood, but which became provable in a proceeding to reorganize the corporation under § 77B of the Bankruptcy Act subsequently enacted. P. 299 U. S. 462.

83 F.2d 202; 85 id.11, reversed.

Certiorari to review a judgment of the Circuit Court of Appeals which affirmed the District Court in rejecting nine claims of landlords for future rent, or indemnity, in a proceeding to reorganize the lessee corporation under § 77B of the Bankruptcy Act.


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