CREDITORS' BILL

In English practice. A bill in equity, filed by one or more creditors, for an account of the assets of a decedent, and a legal settlement and distribution of his estate among themselves and such other creditors as may come in under the decree. In American practice. A proceeding to enforce the security of a Judgment creditor against the property or interests of his debtor. This action proceeds upon the theory that the Judgment is in the nature of a lien, such as may be enforced in equity. Hudson v. Wood (C. C.) 119 Fed. 775; Fink v. Patterson (C. C.) 21 Fed. 602; Gould v. Torrance, 19 How. Prac. (N. Y.) 560; McCartney v. Bostwick, 32 N. Y. 57. A creditors’ bill, strictly, is a bill by which a creditor seeks to satisfy his debt out of some equitable estate of the defendant, which is not liable to levy and sale under an execution at law. But there is another sort of a creditors’ bill, very nearly allied to the former, by means of which a party seeks to remove a fraudulent conveyance out of the way of his execution. But a naked bill to set aside a fraudulent deed, which seeks no discovery of any property, chose in action, or other thing alleged to belong to the defendant, and which ought to be subjected to the payment of the Judgment, is not a creditors’ bill. Newman v. Willetts, 52 111. 98. Creditorum appellationes non hi tantum accipiuntur qui pecuniam crediderunt, sed omnes quibus ex qualibet causa debetur. Under the head of “creditors” are included, not alone those who have lent money, but all to whom from any cause a debt is owing. Dig. 50, 16, 11.