Court Opinion

ID: 9844325
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:00:56.268828+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:15:32.825388
License: Public Domain

FishburnE, Justice
(dissenting).
*382I regret that I must record a dissent to the leading opinion in this cause, but I cannot agree that the acknowledgment to the title retention contract under consideration is fatally defective. This acknowledgment reads as follows:
“State of Kentucky,
County of Perry:
I, Carl M. Seale, D. C. in and for the county and state aforesaid, certify there came before me in said County and State......Perry, Ky., who produced the foregoing contract and acknowledged same to be his act and deed in due form of law.
Witness my hand this 20 day of January, 1949.
Prentiss Baker Clerk, P. C.
By: Carl M. Seale, D. C.
Notary Public, Perry County, Kentucky.
My Commission expires........”
Under the Kentucky law, which I think is applicable to this case, the title retention contract or chattel mortgage in question, executed by W. E. Poindexter to Seale Motor Company, was entitled to be admitted to record “On the acknowledgment, before the proper clerk, by the party making the deed”.
Immediately above the quoted acknowledgment appears the signature of W. E- Poindexter, who is the party who executed the instrument. Obviously, his name should appear in the blank space in the acknowledgment where the deputy clerk through oversight inserted “Perry, Ky.” instead of the name “W. E. Poindexter.”
By the great weight of authority, a literal compliance with the statutory forms of acknowledgment to conveyances is not exacted. It is the policy of the law to uphold certificates of acknowledgment, and whenever it is found that the law has been substantially complied with, obvious clerical errors and all technical defects or omissions will be disregarded. *3831 C. J. S., Acknowledgments, § 92 (2), Page 855; 1 Am. Jur., Sec. 118, Page 364.
There are many decisions which hold that “it is the policy of the law to construe acknowledgments liberally, and not to allow a conveyance to be defeated by unsubstantial and technical objections to the certificate of acknowledgment.” Wells v. Atkinson, 24 Minn. 161, 165.
And to show the attitude of our Court, I quote the headnote in Arther v Hollowell, 111 S. C. 444, 98 S. E. 202: “Where deed was in fact witnessed by two witnesses, the mere fact that the notary omitted to declare in the probate that one of the witnesses was also present at the execution was not sufficient to invalidate the record, notwithstanding 17 Stats. 319, requiring, before recording, execution to be proved by a subscribing witness and Civ. Code, 1912, § 3453, as to execution.”
It is likewise a rule of general acceptation that a failure to insert the name of the acknowledger in the certificate is not fatal, where the omission may be supplied by reference contained in the certificate to the instrument itself. In this case, the acknowledgment to the title retention contract may be read along with the instrument, for the purpose of showing that the party signing the contract is the same person who acknowledged its execution.
In the case at bar, the deputy clerk’s certificate of acknowledgment is attached to the contract, and, as stated, appears immediately under the signature of W. E. Poindexter, who executed the contract.
When the deputy clerk certifies, as he does here, that a person unnamed came before him, “who produced the foregoing cojitract and acknowledged same to be his act and deed in due form of law,” — to whom does he refer ? Certainly not to the mortgagee. The description given by the deputy clerk must of necessity exclude everyone except the person who produced the contract and acknowledged it to be his act and *384deed. This could have reference to none other than W. E. Poindexter, who executed the instrument. Certainly the failure of the deputy clerk to insert the name of W. E. Poindexter in the certificate is not fatal, because this omission may be supplied by the reference contained in the certificate to the instrument itself. In my-opinion, the question of the identity, of the acknowledger is entirely free from doubt, and I think the acknowledgment in this case adequately and sufficiently complies with the Kentucky law. It is my opinion, therefore, that the judgment should be reversed.