Court Opinion

ID: 9856324
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:44:57.596011+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:38:34.781699
License: Public Domain

EbviN, J.
The defendant makes these assertions by his assignments of error:
1. That the judge did not observe the provisions of Gr.S. 1-185, specifying that “upon the trial of an issue of fact by the court, its decision shall be given in writing, and shall contain a statement of the facts found, and the conclusions of law separately.”
2. That the judge committed error in signing the judgment.
The pleadings in the instant case raise these issues of fact: Whether Mt. Olivet Church is indebted to the defendant; whether the persons who executed the mortgage to the defendant were authorized to do so by Mt. Olivet Church and the annual conference or the bishop of the district in which Mt. Olivet Church is located; and whether the counterclaim is barred by the three-year statute of limitations. The legal importance of the last of the issues is contingent on Mt. Olivet Church being indebted to the defendant.
The parties agreed upon an unusual mode for the trial of the issues of fact in the court below. They stipulated that the question of whether Mt. Olivet Church is indebted to the defendant should be left to the jury, .and that the other issues of fact should be decided by the judge.
Where the trial of an issue of fact by a jury is waived by the parties to a civil action, the judge who tries the issue of fact is required by Gr.S. 1-185 to do these three things in writing: (1) To find the facts on the issue of fact submitted to him; (2) to declare the conclusions of law arising on the facts found by him; and (3) to adjudicate the rights of the parties accordingly. In performing this task, the judge must state his findings of fact and his conclusions of law separately. Woodard v. Mordecai. 234 N.C. 463, 67 S.E. 2d 639.
*593Tbe defendant argues with, much earnestness on his appeal that the trial judge failed “to make any findings of fact” in respect to whether the persons who executed the mortgage to the defendant were authorized to do so by Mt. Olivet Church and the annual conference or the bishop of the district in which Mt. Olivet Church is located, and in that way ignored the plain statutory requirement that a judge who tries an issue of fact must find the facts on such issue.
Candor compels the reluctant observation that the able trial judge fell somewhat short of the exceedingly high standards which ordinarily characterize his judicial labors when he made his findings on the issue of fact under consideration. He ought to have couched his findings in specific language not requiring construction to reveal its meaning, and he ought to have embodied his findings in the document containing his conclusions of law and his adjudication.
Nevertheless, we are constrained to reject the position of the defendant on this phase of the appeal under the rule that the findings of the trial judge will be construed to uphold, rather than to defeat, the judgment, if this may reasonably be done. 64 O.J., Trial, section 1149. When the findings of the judge are interpreted in the light of the pleadings, issues, and evidence, they may justly be held to mean that the three persons who executed the mortgage to the defendant were not authorized to do so by the congregation of Mt. Olivet Church and the annual conference or the bishop of the District in which Mt. Olivet Church is located.
It thus appears that the judge found the facts on the issue of fact under consideration. Since he who does a thing through the agency of another does it himself, the judge found the facts in writing when he dictated his findings to the court reporter and caused the court reporter to transcribe them. He made proper conclusions of law and entered a proper adjudication on the facts found by him when he adjudged the mortgage to be “void and unenforceable” and ordered it canceled as a cloud on the title of Mt. Olivet Church to its church building and its parsonage. 12 C.J.S., Cancellation of Instruments, section 34. He certainly separated his findings of fact and his conclusions of law when he put them in different documents. These things being true, the judge complied in a substantial manner with all the requirements of G-.S. 1-185.
The assignment of error based on the exception to the signing of the judgment raises the solitary question whether the facts found by the judge and the jury support the judgment. Deaton v. Deaton, 234 N.C. 538, 67 S.E. 2d 626; Rader v. Coach Co., 225 N.C. 537, 35 S.E. 2d 609. What has already been said makes it plain that the findings of fact of the judge justify the order for the cancellation of the mortgage. The verdict of the jury sustains the adjudication that the defendant is not entitled to recover anything of the plainti^s on his counterclaim. Indeed, *594tbe verdict also supports tbe order of cancellation. A mortgage wbicb purports to secure tbe payment of a debt bas no validity if tbe debt bas no existence. 59 C.J.S., Mortgages, section 87.
For tbe reasons given, there is in law
No error.