Case ID: teiss_13/html/0237-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "His Honor, JOHN ST. PAUL,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

No. 6568.
    MRS. THOS. STONE vs. GERMAN PROTESTANT HOME FOR THE AGED AND INFIRM.
    Syllabus.
    The maxim that “No one is presumed to give” has no application to a donation made in consideration of services to be rendered the donor.
    Appeal from the Civil District Court for the Parish of Orleans, Division “B,” No. 103,915. Honorable F. D. King, Judge.
    Gross & DePoorter, for plaintiff and appellee.
    0. Schrieber, for defendant and appellant.
    
      Opinion and decree, April 10th, 1916.
    Rehearing refused, May 8th, 1916.
    Writ denied, July 3rd, 1916.
   His Honor, JOHN ST. PAUL,

rendered the opinion and decree of the Court, as follows:

Reuben Goss entered the asylum of the defendant and at the time he did so turned over to the defendant the sum of five hundred dollars ($500.00). He remained in the asylum until his death, .after which his universal legatee claimed the return of the amount as having been merely a deposit.

The defendant claims that the sum was an outright “donation” in consideration of an agreement on its part to care for Goss until he died. This is the positive and uncontradicted testimony of defendant’s president, a gentleman of repute and standing, fully corroborated by a receipt given to Goss at the time and preserved by him until his death, reading as follows:

“N. 0., Sept. 20/11. Received from Reuben Goss the sum of $500.00 as an entrance donation to the German Protestant Home for Aged and Infirm.— ¥m. Frantz, Prest.”

We think the foregoing evidences something more than a donation, it evidences a contract, of which the defendant has carried out the burden and is entitled to the benefit. Hence the maxim that “no one is presumed to give” has no application.

The judgment appealed from is therefore reversed, ano: it is now ordered that plaintiff’s demand be rejected at her cost in both Courts.

Reversed.