Court Opinion

ID: 9834394
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 23:33:21.65004+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:44:14.557465
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
We think appellant has not fully understood just what we held in the opinion;
Appellant refers us to U. O. Colson Co. v. Powell (Tex. Civ. App.) 13 S.W.(2d) 405, and, quoting from that case, submits that the defense that plaintiff is a foreign corporation without a permit to do business in this state, and with no right to maintain the suit, must be specially pleaded by Bigelow, and would .be waived by not pleading and proof.
That holding was a correct statement of the law in that case, an equitable proceeding to set aside a judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction, and from which the party seeking relief had an adequate remedy by appeal, but did not avail itself of it. A review of the eases referred to by Judge Blair in that case will fully reveal the character oí cases where the law stated in that case is applicable.
That case and the cases there referred to have no application to this case. The only question in the instant case is the sufficiency of the proof to show that appellee, a foreign corporation, had a permit to do business in this state and whether it had such permit at the time the business involved in the suit was transacted.
The case of Taber v. Interstate Bldg. & Loan, 91 Tex. 92, 40 S. W. 954, 955, and referred to in the original opinion, decided the questions presented here on a certified question. It was there held: “It was necessary for the corporation (plaintiff below) to prove that it had-a permit to do business in Texas at the time that the contract sued upon was made in order that the court might enter judgment in its favor.” In that case the question was raised by general denial. In Washington-Dean Co. v. Crow Bros. et al. (Tex. Civ. App.) 1 S.W.(2d) 914, it is said that foreign corporations must allege and prove permit to transact business in this state. In Elliott Electric Co. v. Clevenger (Tex. Civ. App.) 300 S. W. 91, it was contended, as here, that objection of noncompliance of a foreign corporation with the statute requiring a permit was a matter of defense. It was held that in this state compliance with the statute of permit to do business, in view of its terms, must be both pleaded and proved by the foreign corporation to entitle it to maintain the action, and refers to Taber v. Building & Loan Ass’n, supra, and other cases referring to the Taber Case so holding.
. See cases in Shepards S. W. Rep. Citations, vol. 23, November, 1930 p. 93.
There is no doubt, in our opinion, but that the burden of proof is on the foreign corporation to show its right'to sue and to have judgment in its favor, and that it had such right at the time the transactions were had. We have found no ease holding otherwise.
The motion is overruled.