St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1889-12-05
A WISCONSIN LAND SUIT
Knocked Out by Judge Brill Sus.
- tanning a Demurrer.

knocked Gut by Judge Brill SuS-
80 tanning "a Demurrer.
! iJndge Brill of the district court sus-
tanned demurrer to the complaint of
.tathes A. Smith against John T.. Glover,
thus Diminishing the case. The suit
grew out of contract, which was en-
tered into by ii. L.. Page and Nathan
Pearlers, formerly of Milwaukee, with
Jg j.. Glover and John Mcclure. of st.
Groix, Wis, IN 1872, which provided for
the; location and entry by the latter
gentlemen of pine timber lands in
Northwestern Wisconsin, Page and
Pearlers furnishing the purchase
money. The lands were to be
catered in the names of Pape and Pear
lers, aud after three years they were to
sell lands to pay purchase money, in
tefest and taxes. 1t also provided for
the conveyance of half of the remain
der of lands to Glover and Mcclure.
Under this contract it was claimed that
2.33O.15 acres of land were entered in
August and September, 1872. in the
names of Page and Pearlers, both of
whom died soon after; that Mcclure as
signed his interest to Glover, and Aug.
II, 1874, Glover assigned all interest in
the lands to plaintiff for the sum of
81 800; that after the death of Page and
PearlerS, who held the legal title to the
lands, their personal representatives
and heirs disposed of the whole
amount of lands in question
for sums aggregating about $20,O0O.
1t was further claimed that the contract
on which the suit was based had never
been recorded, and that the plaintiff did
not know of the recording of the deeds
of conveyance of the lands until Feb
ruary 1889. In the year 1878 the legisla-
ture of Wisconsin passed law prOVld-
ing that deed, mortgage or other
in equity upon real estate, which shall
not be recorded as provided by law, shall
be void as to subsequent purchasers in
good faith for valuable consideration.
and giving validity to recorded papers
in their priority. There were excepted
from the provisions of this law, among
other things, patents from the
United States. The claim of
plaintiff was that this law was
passed after the contract was made
and should not affect it, and he sought
to,require the defendant to account for
the amount realized from sales of lands.
The memorandum of Juage Brill in sus-
tanning the demurrer stated in sub
stance that the contract is not we'll eX-
pressed. 1t provided that Page and
Rearlers might hold title i'll the lands
for an indefinite length of time. They
did hold utle-the presumption is
with the consent of the other parties to
the contract, in which case the statute
of limitations did not run; but Page
and PearlerS were entitled at
any time after three years
to sell enough lands, or the whole of it,
if necessary. to reimburse themselves
for expenditures, including the pur-
chase price. interest and taxes. 1t does
not appear that it was not necessary to
sell all the lands for this purpose, and
hence it does not appear that the sale
by the heirs of Page and PearlerS was
wrongful, and if not wrongful. the pur-
chasers could not be liable in any event.
Even if a sale of the whole was not nee
eSSafy, the right to sell not being con-
fined to any particular portion, it is
doubtful whether any action would lie
against the purchasers of the whole.