Case Name: Moses Driver, plaintiff in error, vs. William A. Maxwell, administrator, defendant in error
Court: Supreme Court of Georgia
Jurisdiction: Georgia
Decision Date: 1876-01
Citations: 56 Ga. 11
Docket Number: 
Parties: Moses Driver, plaintiff in error, vs. William A. Maxwell, administrator, defendant in error.
Judges: Warner, Chief Justice, concurred, but furnished no written opinion.
Reporter: Georgia Reports
Volume: 56
Pages: 11–22

Head Matter:
Moses Driver, plaintiff in error, vs. William A. Maxwell, administrator, defendant in error.
1. If, in the affidavit to obtain a distress warrant, a definite sum is claimed to be due for rent, the time when it became due need not appear, nor need the terms of the rent contract be set out, such as that the rent agreed upon was a part of the crop, etc. If these facts become material in any stage of the litigation, they may be proved, and it will be no variance.
2. In this state, the burthen of keeping the premises in repair is generally on the landlord, but patent defects existing at the time of the renting, and equal ly well known to both parlies, are not to be amended by him, or at his expense, without a special undertaking. On the other hand, the tenant is not obliged to amend them without a like undertaking on his part.
3. Where the rent reserved is one-third of the corn and one-fourth of the cotton raised on the premises in the given year, and at the time of the renting both parties know the fence to be in a very bad condition, too low or too weak to keep ordinary stock from trespassing en the crop, and nothing is said about building it higher or repairing it, there is no legal obligation upon either party to make the fence better. The crop is at the mutual risk of the landlord .and tenant, each to the extent of his interest, and whatever part of it may be destroyed by stock in consequence of the fence not being good, is a common loss. The landlord is entitled'to his proportion of what is saved but to nothing for what is lost, and so of the tenant.
Jackson, Judge, dissenting:
1. If the verdict of the jury be right under the evidence, this court should not set it aside, though there may be errors in the charge of the court.
2. This oft-repeated rule of this court should be more rigidly adhered to where the case against the plaintiff in error is made out by the testimony of an impartial witness, and his case supported only by his own evidence.
3. The fact that plaintiff in error made no motion for a new trial in the court below, but brought the case here directly on alleged errors in the charge, ought further to strengthen the application of this wise rule.
4. Whilst, by a strict construction of section 2284 of the Code, it is the duty of the landlord to keep in repair even the fencing around the farm rented, .yet he is not bound to watch the fence and see that it is kept up. That duty devolves on the tenant, who may repair himself and charge the landlord with it, to be accounted for in the rent, or notify the landlord that the fencing needs the repair.
5. If both parties know that the fencing is defective at the time the farm is rented, the contract is made with reference to its condition at that time; unless there be an express contract therefor, the landlord is bound to put it in no better condition; the tenant will be held to rent with his eyes open, and will be bound for the whole rent agreed to be paid, no matter how defective the fence was and what depredations hogs or cattle or storm or sickness made upon it.
6. If the tenant see his crop destroyed by cattle without either fixing the fence himself or notifying the landlord to do it, he neglects a plain duty, which both common sense and the law of self-preservation, as well as the sensible construction of the law of the land, impose upon him, and he and not the landlord should suffer for such gross neglect.
7. When the only proof for the tenant, he himself being the only witness, is injury to his crop in its gathering, arising from sickness of those who gather it, storms in wasting it, and cattle and hogs who prey upon it, and he furnishes no data on which it is possible for a jury to predicate a conclusion in respect to how much injury the crop sustained by the breaking in through a defective fence, of the cattle aiid hogs and the proof of the landlord is that of a disinterested witness, fully sustaining the verdict of the jury, the verdict should stand for these, if all the other reasons given be untenable.
Landlord and tenant. Distress warrant. Pleadings. Before Judge Clark. Sumter Superior Court. October Adjourned Term, 1874.
Eor the facts, see the opinions.
John R. Worrill, for plaintiffs in error.
C. F. Crisp ; N. A. Smith, for defendant.

Opinion:
Bleckley, Judge.
1. The affidavit for distress warrant was for a definite sum alleged to be due for rent, but did not disclose when it became due, or set forth the terms of the rent contract. The plaintiff gave evidence of a contract, not payable in money, but in a part of the crop — one-third of tile corn and one-fourth of the cotton to be raised on the premises in the year 1873. With this and some other evidence, a part of it tending to prove the quantity and value of the corn and cotton raised, the plaintiff closed; and the defendant thereupon moved for a non-suit, because it was not averred in the affidavit that the sum distrained for was due, and because there was a variance between the testimony and the facts alleged in the affidavit. The affidavit showed substantially that the amount claimed was due. It failed to show when it became due, but that is not required. Neither is it necessary to set forth the rent contract. What is required is laid down in section 4082 of the Code, and this affidavit conformed to all the provisions of that section. Whatever of detail was relevant in any stage of subsequent litigation, was admissible evidence without other or fuller pleading than the affidavit as it was. All that " any person who may have rent due," is required to swear, in order to obtain a distress warrant, is prescribed; and whoever goes that far is entitled to prove the actual facts of his case when he is met and resisted with an issue. The motion for a non-suit was properly overruled.
2. The Code, section 2284, introduced a new rule on the subject of keeping rented premises in repair, devolving the burden on the laudlord instead of upon the tenant, where it rested by the rule of the common law. This statutory obligation of the landlord has been frequently considered by this court; 48 Georgia Reports, 172; 49 Ibid., 272; 38 Ibid., 542; 39 Ibid., 210; Whittle vs. Webster, 55 Ibid., 180. Generally, no doubt, where full rent is reserved, the landlord is to be understood as letting his property in a condition reasonably fit for the purpose for which it is intended to be used, and as binding himself to keep it in that condition, on proper notice from his tenant, by making necessary repairs, or authorizing them to be made at his expense. But where the premises, by reason of patent defects, known alike to both parties, are, at the time they are offered for rent, out of repair and unfit for safe or comfortable use, the tenant ought to reject them if he is not satisfied to accept them as they are; and if he does accept them, no matter what price he agrees to pay, the landlord, in the absence of a special undertaking to do more, should be held for such repairs only as become requisite to keep the property in as good condition as when it was rented. He may well say to the tenant, "you knew what you got; I offered my property as it was, and did not hold it out to you for more than it was." In such a transaction all the conditions of fair dealing would be met and satisfied. On the other hand, however ruinous and dilapidated the property might be, the tenant, without some special undertaking on his part, no matter at how cheap a rent he was admitted into possession, would be under no legal obligation to make any repairs or to call for any; certainly he would be under no duty to his landlord to make or call for any which the latter knew were needed at the time of entering into the rent contract. Surely the tenant would be at legal and moral liberty to remain quiet so long as the premises were in as good a condition as when he received them. That much was his privilege under the old rule of law, when he himself had to make repairs. He was bound for such repairs only as were requisite to maintain the status quo; in some cases, perhaps, not for that much.
3. If these views are correct, their application to the present ease is not difficult. The contract of renting was made with the tenant by an agent of the landlord. It was for one year, 1873, and the landlord's compensation was to be one-third of the corn and one-fourth of the cotton raised on the premises. It is not shown to have been in writing — the presumption is it was in parol. The agent of the landlord testifies that the fence was in very bad condition, insufficient to turn and keep off ordinary stock from destroying the crop; that plaintiff and defendant both knew it at the time of the renting, and that nothing was said as to who should put the fence in condition to protect the crop. The tenant testifies that nothing was said as to who was to put the fence in condition to protect the crop; that all the parties knew the fence was no account, and would not turn any kind of stock; and that in many places a man could step over it with ease. In relation to the crop made, its value, and what became of it, the agent testifies, that the corn raised was something like one hundred and thirty or one hundred and forty or one hundred and fifty bushels, worth $1 00 per bushel; and the cotton something like thr.ee or four bales; that good cotton was worth some thirteen cents per pound,but this was very popr, because the tenant and his hands, being sick in the fall, did not gather the crops till late, and the storms and the stock injured them very much. The tenant testifies that he raised about four bales of cotton, and about one hundred bushels of corn; that about forty bushels of the corn was destroyed by hogs and cattle; that the cattle destroyed all the cotton except two bales, of four hundred pounds each; that the cotton was rather poor, on account of bad weather and the cattle running over it before it was gathered; and that he sold it for eleven cents per pound, which was the best price he could get. He testifies further, that the rent corn and cotton were to be delivered on the premises; that he put up the rent corn, thirty-three bushels, in a crib, as agreed, and that he tendered to plaintiff's agent one-fourth of the cotton, in the seed, which the agent declined to receive, requiring it to be ginned, baled and delivered in Americus. It does not appear what finally became of the corn put up as rent. The presumption is that the cotton tendered in the seed was afterwards ginned, and formed a part of the two bales sold.
On the facts in evidence there was no legal obligation upon either party to make the fence better. Both knew of its condition, and neither stipulated to make repairs or to be chargeable with them. The crop was at the mutual risk of the parties, to the extent of such interest as each had in its preservation. Whatever was lost by reason of the bad fence was as if it had not been produced. Neither party was bound to make the loss good to the other. There is no evidence that the fence deteriorated or became in a worse condition than when the parties contracted. Its then insufficiency continued, and there is no evidence of any fault or default on the part of either landlord or tenant. Both parties risked the fence just as they did the soil and the seasons. What the ground would produce and the fence secure they were to divide; what the weather or the cattle destroyed was gone beyond recovery and gave no right to compensation.
The court's charge to the jury was erroneous in so far as it departed from this theory of the law; and inasmuch as the verdict could have been for less than it was, consistently with the evidence, if a correct charge had been given, the judgment is reversed and a new trial granted.
Judgment reversed.
Warner, Chief Justice, concurred, but furnished no written opinion.