Court Opinion

ID: 9831159
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 20:52:05.064648+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:43:31.975922
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
It is contended by counsel for appellees in the motion for rehearing, supported by an elaborate written argument, that the former opinion in the instant case is error because the facts alleged by appellant are insufficient to entitle her to an injunction. The contention is founded upon the mistaken idea that the power to grant an injunction in this case is limited by the rule established in Texas prior to the adoption in 1909 of the amended article 4643. The law announced by those old cases is. thus clearly expressed in the case of Mann v. Wallis, Landes & Co., 75 Tex. 613, 12 S. W. 1124;
“While there is some conflict of decision, the great weight of authority sustains the proposition that a sale of land under execution will not be enjoined at the instance of one not a party to the execution on the sole ground that such third person claims to own the property. To entitle such a person to injunction he must show that his right will be injuriously affected, or that some irreparable injury will follow if the sale be made. This is the settled rule of this court. Carlin v. Hudson, 12 Tex. 203 [62 Am. Dec. 521]; Henderson v. Morrill, 12 Tex. 1; Whitman v. Willis, 51 Tex. 432; Purinton v. Davis, 66 Tex. 456 [1 S. W. 343]; Spencer v. Rosenthall, 58 Tex. 4. It was incumbent on appellant to allege such facts as would show if the sale proceeded that he had not a clear and adequate remedy at law for the enforcement of any right he may have.”
Supporting this rule, counsel for appellee cited Texas Land & Mortgage Co. v. Worsham, 5 Tex. Civ. App. 245, 23 S. W. 938; Brown v. Ikard, 33 Tex. Civ. App. 661, 77 S. W. 967; Chamberlain v. Baker, 28 Tex. Civ. App. 499, 67 S. W. 532; McGoffin v. San Antonio Brewing Association, 84 S. W. 843; Latham Co. v. Shelton, 57 Tex. Civ. App. 122, 122 S. W. 941; Huggins v. White, 7 Tex. Civ. App. 563, 27 S. W. 1066.
All of the above cases were decided prior to 1909, the date of the amended statute of 1909. However, while the rule stated was the settled law in Texas prior to the 1909 *606amendment, there was a well-established exception to it as clearly announced in Gardner v. Douglass, 64 Tex. 76; Huggins v. White, 7 Tex. Civ. App. 563, 27 S. W. 1066; Van Ratcliff v. Call, 72 Tex. 492, 10 S. W. 578; Barr v. Simpson, 54 Tex. Civ. App. 105, 117 S. W. 1041; Texas Land & Mort. Co. v. Worsham, 5 Tex. Civ. App. 245, 23 S. W. 938.
The facts of the case at bar bring this case within the recognized exception to the rule. The exception was that an injunction could be granted to enjoin the sale under execution, where extraneous evidence was required to establish the superior title, for instance, where the property was a homestead, or the property was the separate property of the wife, but did not so appear upon the deed record, or where the deed had not been placed of record. In the case at bar the deed to Mrs. Stolte was a gift from her husband. The execution was issued under a judgment against her husband, and the judgment showed on its face that it was a debt against the husband existing prior to the gift deed. This judgment was prima facie evidence of the facts shown therein. The statute declared the gift deed void if there was a prior debt due by her husband. After sale under execution, the issue, which was the superior title, would necessarily depend upon evidence dehors the record.
However, a discussion of the old rule and its exceptions is now purely academic and interesting only as an incident of the history of the evolution of law, for the Legislature in 1909 amended the statute pertaining to injunctions by adding to the third paragraph of article 4643 a clause that expressly and completely changed the old rule, destroyed the force of all previous decisions upon the subject, and substituted therefor a new and distinct rule, in the following words:
“Judges of the district court * ⅜ ⅜ may grant writs of r injunctions _ * * * where a cloud would be put on the title of real estate being sold under an execution against a person, * * * laying no interest in such real estate subject to the execution at the time of the sale * ⅜ * irrespective of any legal remedy at law.”
The phrase, “cloud would be put on the title,” as used in the statute, means a claim of a right in lands. 5 R. C. L. 634. Since the enactment of the amendment, the density of the cloud can make no difference in the right to the injunction. 2 Words and Phrases, 1233.
It is true that in the Worsham Case there is defined the density of the cloud on the title that was necessary in order to invoke the equity jurisdiction under the exception to the old rule denying aid of equity where there is a legal remedy at law. But when the old rule was abolished by the statute the density of the cloud became immaterial. Any cloud upon the title could be prevented by injunction irrespective of any legal remedy at law. The proposition that the Legislature, by the use of the phrase, “cloud would be put on the title,” meant such a dense cloud as was declared in the Worsham Case to be sufficient to justify an injunction, and thereby left the law as it was prior to the statute, is untenable. Such an interpretation would make the amendment fruitless and useless. A statute cannot be given a construction that would render it futile and purposeless, when it can be otherwise construed. That the Legislature did not intend to make a meaningless and purposeless change by the amendment is clearly shown by the language used in the emergency clause of the same act, contained in section 6, as follows:
“The fact that there is now no well-defined and settled statutes on law and equity to properly prevent a cloud on title of real estate, ⅜ ⅜ ⅜ being sold under an execution against a person * * ⅜ having no interest in such real estate ⅜ ⅜ * without resorting to the legal remedy at law, creates an emergency and an imperative necessity * ⅜ ⅜ that this act take effect ⅜ ⅜ ⅜ from and after its passage.” Gen. Laws of Texas, 31st Leg. 1909, p. 356; Winkie v. Conatser, 171 S. W. 1017; S. K. McCall Co. v. Page, 155 S. W. 655.
After this act became the law the court, in the case of Latham Co. v. Shelton, 57 Tex. Civ. App. 122, 122 S. W. 941, recognized that it changed the old rule in force up to that time.
The only other decision cited by appellee which was rendered after 1909 was the ease of Ward v. Caples, 170 S. W. 816, but inasmuch as that case has not even the remotest relevancy to the principle of law here involved, its citation must have been an inadvertence.
The motion for rehearing is overruled.