Court Opinion

ID: 9829958
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 19:45:14.601988+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:09.429080
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.'
[4] Upon further consideration we conclude that we were in error in holding that the evidence was sufficient to raise the issue of title in defendants to the 10-acre tract under the 10-year statute of limitations, and in further holding that that issue should have been submitted to the jury. While we cannot agree with the learned trial judge in the view upon which he instructed a verdict as to this tract, we do believe that a peremptory instruction in favor of appellee was pn'operly given. It has been often held that, where a judgment has been properly entered for a party, the fact that it is based upon a wrong conclusion of law is immaterial. As showing the ground upon which our conclusion is based that the evidence was insufficient to raise the issue, we here set out the most material parts of the testimony of the witnesses whose testimony was relied upon to prove it. W. F. Ludtke, witness for appellants, testified on direct examination:
“In 1903, in the spring, I fenced that 10-acre tract, just that way, and kept my cattle in it.”
On cross-examination he testified:
. “I put that fence there about 1903. The fence I am speaking about is the 10-acre tract. I fenced that land for a man named II. P. Hub-hard, and I told Hubbard, ‘This is my father’s land and my mother’s land; we own this land.’ He says, ‘That is nothing here or there; fence it.’ and I fenced it, and there has been nobody come around and asked for a nickel of rent at all, and we have been in possession of it ever since. I began to claim it for my own aside from any interest my father or mother claimed in there in about 1902. In 1902 I claimed the whole of it. 1 do not know who I claimed against. My father was living until 1908. As to the title to the 10-acre tract, I will say that we have been in possession of it, and I put a fence there. I also claimed that I fenced it and had been in possession of it for Mr. D. P. Hubbard, who was going to buy it from Mr. Harris. I told him at the time, I said, ‘This is my father’s property.’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you fence it, because I am not asking you whose land it is.’ I told him I would fence it for so much money. I was not claiming any individual interest myself; my father was then claiming it. That was before my father’s death. The other children were not claiming this 10-acre tract themselves. My father was still living when I fenced it in. 1903. My father was claiming that land, and I told Mr. Hubbard of that fact. After I fenced this land I began claiming this land for myself at this time, which might have been a month or so after. He told me (meaning Hubbard), T am not able to pay you for doing the work until after getting through with my troubles, and you use the land,’ and I have been using it ever since. I went into possession under that sort of arrangement. My father -was still claiming that land when I went into possession. I might have been claiming against my father, but my father never told me to get off of it. Mr. Hubbard also told me to use it and lets me use it yet. I did not buy any of that property down there. I did not buy any of it from my father. I did not buy any of it from Mr. Hubbard. I just thought Mr. Hubbard was good enough to let me stay in possession of that property, and that, it would be all right. There is no use to buy property if you do not have to pay for it. I made this arrangement with Mr. I-Iu'bbard in the early part of 1903. The way I .fix that date is that I had just moved down there *269to the old place on this piece of land here, right about in here (Boyal addition); that is the reason I got the date fixed down. It was just about the date I got married, maybe about a year after I got married. As to this arrangement or agreement with Mr, Hubbard, he came down there and a man named Sullivan. I guess he was a real estate man — I would know him if I saw him — and he said, ‘Well, Mr. Hubbard is going to buy that 10 acres of ground here in the bend; do you know where it is?’ And I said, ‘Les, sir; I know where it is.’ ‘A man 'by the name of Hanna surveyed that land; it belonged to my father and mother.’ Mr. Hubbard said, I do not care who it belongs to. I am giving $10,-000 for it, and what will you fence it for? And I put my price and told him I would fence it for so much, and I fenced it, and then I went back to Mr. Hubbard and said, T would like to get my money,’ and he said, ‘No; I cannot pay, but wait and stay in possession of the. land until I come back from the north, and I will pay you for the whole and straighten up the matter. He came back, and I sued him for the money and got my money all right, and I stayed in possession of the land and used it and kept my cattle in there, and after that I used it straight on. Mr. Hubbard never did come back to collect rent from me, and nobody else asked, me for any rent since that time. My father did not quitclaim that property just as soon as I went into possession of it for Mr. Hubbard. I have a quitclaim from my father to me and Pete Ludtke. As to whether my father quitclaimed that land after I went into possession for Mr. Hubbard, in those days he was feeble and could not g'et around hardly at all. He was very old when he died. I told my father about getting into possession for Mr. Hubbard, and he said I should not have fenced it. He said, ‘What made me fence it?’ And I said I might as well take the money as anybody else. He (meaning August Ludtke) did not permit me to use it then; I used it on my hardness. My father did not use it at the same time. Mr. Hubbard did not tell me to stay off, he let me come in, and I am there yet. I stayed in possession of it, and I used it for myself and my father and you too, and Mr. Hubbard or anybody else.”
On redirect examination the witness W. E. Ludtke testified:
“Speaking of this map and by its identifications, the fence that I 'built in 1903 for D. P. Hubbard is shown on this map by the letter ‘A.’ ”
E. E. Westergreen testified:
“I know that this 10-acre tract has been fenced. It was fenced in 1903, and part of it is there now, part of the fence is there now — only it is down.”
On cross-examination the .witness Wester-green testified:
“I said that this 10-acre tract down there was fenced about 1903. W. F. Ludtke fenced it; he got the contract, I was told, from this fellow Herbert (meaning Hubbard). He put the fence up there for Mr. Herbert.”
P. P. Ludtke testified:
“The fence A, being a fence running north and south down to the bend in the bayou, was placed there in 1903. It stayed there about 6 or 7 years. W. E. Ludtke put that fence there.”
On cross-examination he testified:
“No, sir; my father did not put a fence on this 10 acres; my brother, W. E. Ludtke, did. He did it in 1903 for a man by the name of Hubbard. I never did see tlie man in my life. I know only what my 'brother told me. I know that W. E. Ludtke fenced the land for Hubbard. He told me be went into possession under Mr. Hubbard. Yes, sir; he told me all about it. This 10 acres was fenced up for 7 or'8 years.”
[5] It will be seen from the testimony of said witnesses that the only actual possession held by any of the Ludtkes was under and by permission of Hubbard, and there was no such repudiation of tenancy under Hubbard by W. F. Ludtke or of any'of the other appellants proved as was sufficient to start the statute to running in their favor. Certain detached and loose expressions of these witnesses, construed by themselves and not in connection with their testimony above set out, might indicate an actual adverse possession and claim by them, but their testimony, 'when construed as a whole, shows that the land was fenced by W. E. Ludtke for Hubbard, and afterwards occupied by him with Hubbard’s consent, and not adversely to Hubbard or any one else. We think, therefore, that the court was authorized to peremptorily instruct a verdict as to the 10 acres upon the view that adverse possession by the Ludt-kes was not shown, and that the judgment against them, although based upon an erroneous conclusion, should not be disturbed.
Affirmed.