9 ON RECEIVERS IN CHANCERY. CHAPTER I. OF RECEIVERS GENERALLY. POWER OF THE COURT TO APPOINT A RECEIVER; AND APPOINTED. Power of the Court to appoint a Receiver; and the utility of such an officer. THE power of the court of chancery in England, to appoint receivers, appears to have been very frequently called into action during more than a century past. All the leading principles in relation to it were well established there, long before our Revolution; and it was then and has ever since been con sidered, there and here, a a power of as great utility as any which belongs to a court of chancery. And that it is so, will appear very evident from a review of the nature and the variety of the exigencies in which it has been called into action, either to prevent fraud, save the subject of litigation from mateFra injury or rescue it from inevitable destruction: Williamson v. Wilson, 1 Bland's (Maryland) Ch. R. 420; Skip v. Harwood, 3 Atk. 564. The exercise of the power must depend upon sound discretion, and in a case which it must appear fit and reasonable that some indifferent person should be a receiver: Verplank v. Caines, 1 J. C. R. 57; Ex parte Walker, 25 Ala. 81. There is no case in which the court appoints a receiver merely because the measure can do no harm : Orphan Asylum v. M'Cartee, Hopk. 435. The appointment of a person as receiver over a kind of property the management of which he does not understand, with an undertaking to act under the direction of a person who does understand it, is proper: Lupton v. Stephenson, 11 Ir. Eq. R. 484. What is a Receiver. A receiver is an indifferent person between the parties, appointed by the court to receive the rents, issues or profits of land, or other thing in question in this court pending the suit, where it does not seem reasonable (to the court) that either party should receive them: Wyatt's Prac. Reg. 335; The Chautauque County Bank v. White, 6 Barb. S. C. Rep. 589. He is an officer of the court: Matter of Burke, 1 B. & B. 74; and, therefore, he is not to be disturbed by anybody, not even by a party, without leave of the court: Fairfield v. Weston, 2 Sim. & S. 98; Bryan v. Cormick, 1 Cox, 422; Wardle v. Lloyd, 2 Moll. 388; Hutchinson v. Ld. Bassarene, 2 B. & B. 55; MS. case of Broad v. Wickham, in 1 Smith's Ch. Pract. 500. And when a tenant has attorned to a receiver, the court becomes the landlord: Angel v. Smith, 9 Ves. 335. He has (as we shall hereafter show) some privileges, and is under some restraints: 1 Grant's Ch. Pr. 298, 2d edition. But he has no powers, except such as are conferred by order and practice: The Chautauque County Bank v. White, supra. His appointment is provisional only: Skip v. Harwood, 3 Atk. 564; Cooke v. Gwyn, 3 Atk. 690. A receiver appointed by the court is appointed on behalf of all parties, and not of the complainant or of the defendant only: Davis v. The Duke of Marlborough, 2 Swanst. 125. He is appointed for the benefit of all parties who may establish rights in the cause; and the money in his hands is in custodia legis for whoever can make out a title to it: Portman v. Mills, 8 L. J. (N. S.) Ch. 161; Delany v. Mansfield, 1 Hogan, 234. And so long as a cause is undecided, no order for a receiver will affect the rights of parties or property: Skip v. Harwood, 3 Atk. 564. Although a receiver is an officer to hold property for the benefit of the party ultimately entitled to it, yet when such party is ascertained, the receiver is considered as his receiver: In re Colvin, |