Court Opinion

ID: 9834164
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 23:21:26.998154+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:44:12.313753
License: Public Domain

On Rehearing.
In the original opinion, we declined to consider whether there was any evidence or the sufficiency of evidence to show that defendant in error had actually resided in Taylor county for six months next preceding the filing of her amended petition, because, as *815stated in tlie opinion, there was no assignment or proposition presenting that question. This conclusion was based on the fact that plaintiff in error’s entire argument was that there had not been six months’ residence pri- or to the filing of the original petition, and the conclusion we reached on authority of the cases cited that six months’ residence prior to the filing of the amended petition was sufficient, even though there had not been six months’ residence prior to the filing of the original petition, seemed a sufficient answer to the contention made.
In his motion for rehearing, plaintiff in error ' insists .that the assignment was broad enough to require a review of the existence of any evidence or sufficiency of evidence to show the required residence prior to the filing of the ¿mended petition. 'The assignment in question reads as follows: “The court erred in not dismissing this cause of action as filed by the plaintiff, as the testimony of the plaintiff herself clearly shows that she had not resided in Taylor County, the county in which this ease was filed by plaintiff, for, the six months period required by the State statutes to give this court jurisdiction to hear and determine this cause.”
If we bear in mind that there is such a distinction betw&n an assignment complaining of the lack of any evidence to support a judgment and an assignment complaining of the insufficiency of the evidence as that one of such questions cannot be considered under an assignment raising the other [Hall Music Co. v. Robinson, 117 Tex. 261, 1 S.W.(2d) 857], it is a little difficult to classify the above assignment, but, waiving that matter, and treating the assignment as raising the question of the sufficiency of the evidence to show the necessary residence, a serious question is presented whether the evidence was sufficient. We will not undertake to set out the evidence or determine the question of its sufficiency, as we have concluded that, for the reasons hereafter stated, the case will have to be reversed on another ground. /
The transcript shows .that the amended petition was filed the same day that judgment was rendered. There had not existed six months’ residence of the plaintiff in Taylor county when the original petition was filed, February 21, 1928. The filing of the amended pleading on May 29, 1928, must be regarded as the beginning of the suit within the statutory requirement as to six months’ residence in .the county. Regardless, then, of whether or not the evidence was sufficient to show a six months’ residence next preceding the filing of the amended pleading on May 29, 1928, the express prohibition of Rev. St. 1925, art. 4632, that the suit shall not be heard or determined before the expiration of thirty days after same is filed affirmatively appears from the record to have been disregarded. Three Courts of Civil Appeals have held this provision mandatory. Beeler v. Beeler (Tex. Civ. App.) 218 S. W. 553; Snow v. Snow (Tex. Civ. App.) 223 S. W. 240; Hunt v. Hunt (Tex, Civ. App.) 196 S. W. 967.
In Snow v. Snow, supra, the court had occasion to consider whether a judgment rendered in violation of the statute was void or merely voidable, and concluded that it was void. Apparently the Fort Worth Court of Civil Appeals, in Hunt v. Hunt, supra, considered the question without any assignment raising it, and as incidental to a determination of whether or not an amended petition could be regarded as the institution of the suit within the provision requiring six months’ previous residence. We believe we are justified in following these authorities". If the judgment is void, as has been held, •then clearly enough its invalidity appears affirmatively as a matter of record. We believe it our duty to take notice of the same as a fundamental error, for which reason the motion for rehearing will be granted.
The judgment heretofore rendered affirming the cause will be reversed and the cause remanded.