1. A judgment or money decree bears interest, at the legal rate, from the time of entry until the time of satisfaction, and such interest may be recovered under execution. Inasmuch as the taxed costs are a part of the amount fixed in and by the judgment or decree as due on and by reason of the judgment, interest naturally runs on that amount as well as on any other sum entering into the amount of the judgment or decree.
2. It may well be that where levy under execution has been made upon property amply sufficient to produce, on sale, sufficient moneys to enable the sheriff to pay to the judgment creditor the full amount of the decree and interest as directed by the execution, if such execution sale should be prosecuted and held with reasonable promptitude, the decree should be deemed satisfied for all other purposes except the prosecution of such execution sale of the property so levied upon for raising thereout the moneys requisite to the payment (besides sheriff's fees and costs of sale) to the judgment creditor of the full amount due him under the decree. However, this is far from saying that the moment levy is made on sufficient property of the debtor to enable the sheriff in due course to comply with the command of the fieri facias, the decree is to be deemed satisfied at that moment, as between the judgment creditor and the judgment debtor, and that the judgment creditor is not entitled to receive, even out of the property so levied on, any interest after that date, even though the judgment debtor by various devices obstructs and prevents the prosecution of the execution sale for months or years.
3. The deposits made by the defendants with the clerk of the court in this case were not made at their own instance and volition, but because the court required them to be made, as a condition for granting a temporary stay of enforcement of execution. However, these moneys were to be available for application to the satisfaction of the decree if and when the court should so direct. The court did so direct, but from that order the defendants immediately appealed. The effect of the appeal was to stay the operation of the order appealed from so as to preserve the subject-matter of the appeal. The appeal prevented the use of the money on deposit with the clerk in satisfaction of the decree, so that there is no equitable basis for a claim by the defendants that interest should not run against them during pendency of the appeal.
4. In this case, the clerk of the court paid over the moneys deposited with him by the defendants pursuant to the order of the court, dated February 6th, 1940, prior to the expiration of the 10-day period during which execution ordinarily does not issue on a decree. Defendants appealed from the order on February 15th, 1940. Under Chancery rule 162, if appeal be filed within such 10-day period, process to enforce the decree will not issue without further order. Doubtless the clerk should not have made payment, without special direction, prior to February 16th, nor after February 16th until the determination of the appeal. Had the money remained with the clerk, it would have earned interest. Equity considers as done that which should have been done, and defendants should be given credit for the interest which would have been earned, against the amount of interest which continued to run on the unpaid amount due under the decree.
5. The amount due to the sheriff for his fees under the execution is not the concern of the trustee-judgment creditor. It is a matter purely between the sheriff and the judgment debtors; and no dispute or issue between them, or between the trustee and them or either of them, on this subject is presented to the court in this proceeding. It is therefore neither necessary nor proper that any determination in regard thereto should be made or considered herein.
PER CURIAM.
This appeal is taken by the defendant Kinmonth only. The executors of W. Harvey Jones, deceased, have made payment of one-half of the sum thus found to be due.
The point made by appellant here is that "if interest is nevertheless to run upon a decree that was satisfied as a matter of law on March 2d 1939, then it should not run beyond January 16th or January 17th, 1940, when there was deposited with the clerk of the Court of Chancery in cash a sum representing more than was due under the decree when the deposit was made;" and that, at all events, "the running should certainly stop when the money" was actually paid over by the clerk to the substituted trustee.
We concur in the reasoning and conclusion of the learned Vice-Chancellor in this regard; and the order is accordingly affirmed.
For affirmance — THE CHIEF-JUSTICE, PARKER, CASE, BODINE, DONGES, HEHER, PERSKIE, PORTER, COLIE, DEAR, WELLS, WOLFSKEIL, RAFFERTY, HAGUE, THOMPSON, JJ. 15.
For reversal — None.