Court Opinion

ID: 9664960
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 00:35:31.578917+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:11.777760
License: Public Domain

ON REHEARING
MOORE, Justice.
On Motion for Rehearing, appellees call our attention to the fact that the instrument by which the Davises conveyed the 4.006 acre tract to the State of Texas was a warranty deed conveying title to the surface estate with a reservation of the mineral estate, rather than an easement. While appellees’ interpretation is correct, we do not believe it would have any effect upon our original ruling. The fact remains that when the Davises conveyed the 92.5 acre tract to the Meltons, they did not deduct therefrom any “land,” but only deducted “4.178 acres conveyed to the State of Texas for right of way.” Thus, the exception by its own wording deducted from the conveyance only that which had been previously conveyed. Consequently, if their previous deed to the State conveyed nothing more than the surface estate to the 4.006 acre tract, the exception in the present deed could only mean that the grantors intended to deduct therefrom the surface estate and not the mineral estate. The manifest intention in so doing was to protect the grantors from a claim that they had breached their warranty by conveying that which they had theretofore conveyed the State of Texas.
In view of the fact that the metes and bounds description to the 92.5 acre tract includes the 4.006 acre mineral estate owned by the Davises and excepted only the surface estate over such smaller tract, we remain convinced that the 4.006 acre mineral estate passed to the grantees.
The Motion for Rehearing is overruled.