BONA FIDE
Legal Term: BONA FIDE
Definition: In or with good faith.
2. The law requires all persons in their transactions to act with good faith and a contract where the parties have not acted bonafide is void at the pleasure of the innocent party. 8 John. R. 446, 12 John. R. 320, 2 John. Ch. R. 35. If a contract be made with good faith, subsequent fraudulent acts will not vitiate it, although such acts may raise a presumption of antecedent fraud, and thus become a means of proving the want of good faith in making the contract. 2 Miles Rep. 229, and see also, Rob. Fraud. Conv. 33, 34, Inst. 2, 6 Dig. 41, 3, 10 and 44, Id. 41, 1, 48, Code, 7, 31, 9 Co. 11, Wingates Maxims, max. 37, Lane, 47, Plowd. 473, 9 Pick. R. 265, 12 Pick. R. 545, 8 Conn. R. 336, 10 Conn. R. 30, 3 Watts, R. 25, 5 Wend. R. 20, 566. In the civil law these actions are called (actiones) bonae fidei, in which the judge has a. more unrestrained power (liberior potestas) of estamating how much one person ought to give to or do, for another, whereas, those actions are said to be stricti juris, in which the power of the judge is confined to the agreement of the parties. Examples of the foraier are the actions empti-venditi, locati-conducti, negitiorum gestorum, &c., of the latter, the actions ex mutus, ex chirographo, ex stipilatu, ex indebito, actions proescriptis verbis, &c.
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