Title: Brogoitti Et Ux v. Brown Et Ux

State: oregon

Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court

Document:

Affirmed June 27, 1962.
Roy Kilpatrick, Canyon City, argued the cause and submitted the brief for appellants.
Alex M. Byler and George H. Corey, Pendleton, argued the cause for respondents. With them on the brief was Lawrence B. Rew, Pendleton.
Before McALLISTER, Chief Justice, and ROSSMAN, WARNER, SLOAN, O'CONNELL and GOODWIN, Justices.
AFFIRMED.
ROSSMAN, J.
This is an appeal by the plaintiffs, husband and wife, from a decree entered by the circuit court in a *310 partition suit which the plaintiffs instituted to obtain the partition of real property held by the plaintiff, Marjorie C. Brogoitti, and the defendant, Doris M. Brown, as tenants in common. The real property is, according to the plaintiffs-appellants' brief, "a small wheat ranch which lies on both sides of U.S. Highway 30 just west of the city of Pendleton." Each of the two parties just named owned an undivided one-half interest in the property subject to the inchoate curtesy interest of her husband. Acting pursuant to ORS 105.245, the court appointed three referees to partition the property who later filed a report. Still later the defendants presented objections to the report on the ground that the allotments which it proposed were unequal. The following is taken from the decree.
The brief of the plaintiffs-appellants states:
Counsel for the plaintiffs-appellants is entitled to commendation for his frankness which limits the issue on appeal to the single one just mentioned, that is, Is the jurisdiction of a court in partition suits limited to *312 the sole function of confirming or setting aside the report of the referees, or does it have power to make a modification to the report. We will now consider that issue.
ORS 105.260, which is a part of the section of our laws upon the subject of partition, states:
It will be noticed that the section of our laws just quoted authorizes the court to "confirm or set aside the report in whole or in part."
Section 609 of Powell on Real Property states:
See similarly 2 Restatement Of The Law, Property, page 654. The latter, in referring to the numerous state statutes on the subject of partition, says in part:
Oregon's partition statute renders partition an equitable remedy: Murray v. Murray, 107 Or 121, 213 P 409. The brief of counsel for the plaintiffs-appellants states: "There are no cases in Oregon that I have found directly in point."
Sterling v. Sterling, 43 Or 200, 72 P 741, states:
The question "under consideration" in that case was the effect of a partition decree. The decision noted that § 444 of the partition statute, now ORS 105.260, provided:
*314 Code Civ. Proc. Cal. § 766 (West's Annotated California Codes § 766) provides:
It will be observed that the California and Oregon provisions concerning the power of a court to confirm or set aside the referees' report, although containing some differences in phraseology, have substantially the same meaning.
The following is taken from 37 Cal Jur 2d, Partition, § 77, page 482.
MacDonald et al v. Bernal et al, 34 Cal App 431, 167 P 902, holds:
*315 Machado v. Machado, 66 Cal App2d 401, 152 P2d 457, ruled:
In Morris v. Daniel, 183 Ky 780, 210 SW 668, the court said of a report by a commissioner in a partition:
Shearer v. Shearer, 125 Iowa 394, 101 NW 175, reasoned:
1. The rule is stated as follows in 68 CJS, Partition, § 161, page 272:
We take the following from 40 Am Jur, Partition, § 76, page 65:
2. Without further resort to the authorities, we express the belief that the California courts have correctly construed their statute and that since ours is worded substantially the same as theirs, it should receive a similar interpretation. We are satisfied that when a report of referees in a partition suit is submitted to a trial judge he may, in the words of the statute, "confirm or set aside the report in whole or in part." He may make such modifications to it as the evidence warrants.
The above being our belief, we affirm the decree of the circuit court.