Court Opinion

ID: 9831113
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 20:49:32.259509+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:31.259583
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
Plaintiffs in error complain that our remarks concerning their brief are severe, and proceed to show that the .rule was sufficiently complied with, citing in support of their position rule 30, as construed in the case of Adams et al. v. Adams (Tex. Civ. App.) 253 S. W. 605. It was not our intention to criticize or administer a rebuke that would “become a part of the permanent court record of our state,” or otherwise, and for that reason this court has always carefully refrained from placing lawyers in unpleasant positions before the profession and the public. The reason we have said so much now is to relieve counsel of their erroneous impression, and at the same time, in justice to them, give their viewpoint.'
We do not think the court erred in refusing to give either of the requested charges of plaintiffs in error, to wit:
(8) “In connection with the issue of abandonment submitted, you are instructed that an estate or interest in property once vested or acquired cannot be terminated except by proof of an actual abandonment with the coincident intention to relinquish such estate or interest and not thereafter to assert the same.”
(13) “Xou are instructed that abandonment is a question of intention, and, in order for you to find that the defendants abandoned the lease in question, the intention voluntarily to abandon and relinquish their rights must appear from the evidence.”
The contention is that in cases of abandonment of oil lease contracts there .must be shown “a coincident intention to relinquish such estate and never thereafter to assert any right,” and “the intention voluntarily to abandon and relinquish their rights must appear from the evidence.”
These requested charges would not make any clearer to the jury what they were expected to find from the very clear charge and explanation the court gave them. The court gave in the'charge for the jury to ascertain if plaintiffs in error “abandoned the oil and gas lease.” The definition thereof is: To give up; desert or forsake utterly; give up all claim to; yield oneself. The definition of relinquish is: To forsake or abandon; quit; leave with reluctance; desist from; renounce a claim to.
The words are really synonym's. Clearly, it would have been error to have limited the jury to first find actual abandonment, then to further find a “coincident intention to relinquish.” The court told the jury that abandonment was a question of intention, to be shown by all ‘the facts and circumstances in the case. It has a plain meaning, that is well known and understood by jurors generally, to give up all claim to and relinquish all claim to, and there was no reason to give plaintiffs in error’s charge.
Whatever may be the unfortunate position, in which plaintiffs in error find themselves, in regard to the loss of the gas and oil well already bored', and as much as we would like to give relief, we are precluded by the finding of the issues, by the jury, against plaintiffs in error.
We find nothing new in plaintiffs in error’s brief that was not before presented and now again ably argued in the motion for rehearing.
The motion is overruled.