Court Opinion

ID: 9669307
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 02:48:44.779691+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:55.308030
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Garwood,
joined by Justice Hart, dissenting.
My only point of disagreement with the majority opinion is its holding that, with respect to the undivided interest which Grogan Manufacturing Company (hereinafter called “Grogan”) purchased from the guardian of Willie Lee Smith, n.c.m., the statute of limitations began to run against Grogan and in favor of the Condras from the date of such purchase, although the statute was admittedly never in operation against the incompetent, as it was against his three competent brothers.
The reason for upholding the Condra claim to the undivided interests owned by the three brothers and sold by them to Grogan, is that the invalid partition, followed by the Condra occupancy, was yet enough to set the statute of limitations in motion against the brothers, and that, once set in motion, it was not interrupted by their sale to Grogan, regardless of whether Grogan had or had not any sort of notice of the Condra claim. The theory of Eastham v. Gibbs, 58 Texas Civ. App. 627, 125 S. W. 372, relied upon in the majority opinion is not one of knowledge imputed to the purchaser but that limitations is, to borrow the language of learned counsel for the Condras, “a rule of law”, which, once set in motion, is not interrupted by even a good faith purchase, however much such a purchase may avail as against hidden equities.
But while the majority seems to follow this view in discussing the matter of Grogan’s title acquired from the three brothers, it takes another course on reaching the question of Grogan’s title from the incompetent brother. The latter reasoning is that, although limitations never began to run against the *389incompetent, as it did against his brother, yet when Grogan purchased from the guardian, Grogan was already “charged with notice of the Condra repudiation of the cotenancy, since Grogan had purchased from the three competent brothers who in turn had actual notice, and thus Grogan’s interest purchased from the guardian came under the operation of the statute from the moment this latter purchase was made. It is said that this knowledge of or notice to Grogan of the repudiation of co-tenancy by the Condras was “constructive”, or, in short, that Grogan had neither knowledge nor reason to seek it, but should be treated as if it did have, simply because Grogan was the unfortunate purchaser of a worse title from the brothers than it had reason to think it was getting. Certainly the content of Grogan’s deed from the brothers did not suggest any claim of the Condras, nor is there any general principle of law that charges a purchaser with all his vendors know but fail to disclose. It is not argued that the mere possession of the Condras gave the constructive notice. Such might be the case if we take the language of Collum v. Sanger Bros., 98 Texas 162, 82 S. W. 459, 83 S. W. 184, to be the law, but the majority opinion does not lean at all on that decision, and I think rightly so. Neither Eastham v. Gibbs nor any other case cited in the majority opinion holds that a purchaser from a cotenant, against whom the statute of limitation is running, acquires by his mere purchase constructive notice of the limitation claim, either as to the interest thus purchased or an interest he may later purchase from another cotenant. It is one thing to say that, once that statute begins to run, it continues to run even though the subject matter may pass to a good-faith purchaser. It is another thing to say that because the statute continues thus to run, the erstwhile bona fide purchaser has constructive notice of the claim. Once the statute starts to run, its continuance does not depend on notice of any kind or the absence thereof. It continues to run under its own power.
It seems harsh enough in a situation like the present to defeat the title of the purchaser to the interest purchased from the three brothers, considering that he paid value, found the possession of the adverse claimant to be consistent with the record title and is obviously less careless than the claimant, who failed to write and record the partition agreement upon which he relies. I consider it unjust to go still further and hold that his innocent purchase of an undivided interest, against which a secret limitation claim happens to be maturing, of itself charges him with knowledge that there is an adverse claim to every other undivided interest he may purchase in the same land, even *390though the statute has never started to run against the vendor of the latter.
Opinion delivered October 25, 1950.
Rehearing overruled November 22, 1950.
Justice Smith not sitting.