Definition
A French phrase meaning "in case of need." As used in commercial law, au besoin is a notation incorporated into a bill of exchange identifying a third party — sometimes called the referee in case of need — to whom the holder may turn for payment if the drawee fails or refuses to honor the instrument. The full form of the notation typically reads "au besoin chez [name and place]," meaning "in case of need, apply to [name] at [location]."
The person so designated does not bear primary liability on the bill. They stand as a fallback obligor, available to accept or pay the instrument only after the drawee has dishonored it. The arrangement functions similarly to an acceptance supra protest: the designated party steps in after dishonor rather than as part of the original transaction.
Why It Matters in Research
AU BESOIN appears almost exclusively in older commercial law materials dealing with foreign bills of exchange — instruments drawn between parties in different countries or jurisdictions. Researchers encountering the phrase in 19th-century commercial correspondence, banking records, or mercantile litigation should treat it as a structural feature of the instrument, not a secondary guarantee or endorsement in the modern sense.
The concept has no direct analogue in contemporary U.S. commercial paper doctrine under Articles 3 and 4 of the Uniform Commercial Code. Modern instruments do not use this notation, and the referee-in-case-of-need mechanism largely disappeared with the standardization of domestic commercial paper. Researchers working in UCC contexts will find no statutory hook for this term; it belongs entirely to the pre-codification law merchant tradition.
In historical sources, the phrase sometimes appears without translation, and its legal function can be mistaken for a general endorsement or a guarantee clause. It is neither. The designated party has no obligation until dishonor occurs and, in classic bills of exchange doctrine, may themselves refuse to step in — though doing so dishonors the arrangement commercially if not always legally.
The Rapalje & Lawrence entry in the source material contains no relevant content on this term; that dictionary's entry appears to have been misfiled or corrupted in compilation. Researchers should not rely on that source for this term.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's (1st and 2nd editions) and Bouvier's agree on the core definition: au besoin identifies a fallback payee on a bill of exchange, to be applied to upon dishonor by the drawee. Both cite Story on Bills of Exchange (§ 65 in the first edition, § 66 in the second — a minor discrepancy likely reflecting different editions of Story's treatise rather than a substantive difference).
Burrill's provides the most complete treatment, explicitly analogizing the au besoin party to an acceptor supra protest and noting that the mechanism operates "in the nature of an acceptance supra protest." This framing is useful for research because it connects au besoin to a broader doctrine — acceptance for honor — which does have some historical treatment in English and American equity courts.
None of the historical dictionaries address what happens when the au besoin party also refuses to pay, or whether the holder's failure to apply to the au besoin party before protesting affects rights against prior endorsers. These questions were live in 19th-century commercial litigation and may require consulting Story's treatise directly rather than relying on dictionary summaries.
Jurisdictional Note
AU BESOIN as a functional legal mechanism is rooted in the law merchant and had its fullest development in English and Continental commercial practice. American courts applied the concept in the antebellum period when foreign bills of exchange were common instruments of transatlantic trade. The term does not appear in modern U.S. statutory commercial law and is jurisdictionally obsolete in domestic practice.