Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 10.djvu/669

UNITED STATES V. DE VISSER. 657 �have a legal right to rely in fixing some time -when their risk might be terminated. Nor can it be supposed that sureties would be re- quired by law to enter into obligations to such a vast extent upon risks which might be unlimited in duration, and which they would never have any power to bring to a close. No prudent man eouldbe expected to enter into such an obligation as surety for another; and no unnecessary construction of the statute should be given which would lead to that resuit. This statute, and the regulations under it, do, upon their face, provide approximately such a period for the ter- mination of the surety's risk, by sales prescribed to be had not long after the lapse of the three years; and thereupon any further risk of sureties could be immediately terminated by payment of the debt, and suit against their principals. These provisions, while valuable to the govemment, afford also reasonable protection to sureties ; they are such as sureties would naturally rely upon, and are such as I think the law designed to give them a right to rely upon as a part of their contract; so far, at least, as that the time of sale should not be de- liberately postponed without their assent. If the sale may be indefi- nitely postponed at the option of the secretary of the treasury, and the surety be still held, then these provisions, in the language of the court in U. S. v.Becker, 21 Wall. 656, "instead of affording a limitation and a safeguard to the surety, might prove but a delusion and a snare, and subject him to liabilities which he could not have foreseen, and to the hazard of which he would not willingly have exposed himself." �I do not perceive any interest which the govemment can have in upholding such a power of indefinite postponement of sales. If it has any such interest it can be provided for among the regulations which the statute authorizes to be prescribed. When that is done, sureties will know what to expect if they enter into such obligations thereafter. Untn then their risk cannot be thus indefinitely pro- longed. �In this case the postponement was not apparently for any interest of the govemment, but was given as a favor to third persons, then owners of the goods, who had requested it of the secretary. Such a favor could not be granted at the expense of the surety, by prolonging his risk, without his assent. �A surety's contract is in this respect strictissimi juris. Any pro- longation of his risk, or change in the subject-matter of it, is an alteration of the contract in an essential particular; and if made v.lO.no.e— 42 ��� �