Court Opinion

ID: 9811605
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 22:25:25.334273+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:19:31.204935
License: Public Domain

Clark, C. J.,
concurring: In Carter v. White, 131 N. C., 14, it was held by Cook, J., for a unanimous Court, that a “judgment in partition proceedings allotting a defendant his share in severalty does not prevent his claiming an undivided interest with the plaintiff under an after-acquired title from one not a party to the action, in an ejectment or partition proceedings.” On another appeal in the same case, Carter v. White, 134 N. C., 466, the former decision was overruled by a divided Court, it being then held that “A judgment in a partition proceeding determining the respective interests of parties thereto is binding on said parties as against an after-acquired title.” It has been held in Harrison *103v. Ray, 108 N. C., 215; 11 L. R. A., 722; 23 Am. St, 157, that “in voluntary actual partition the deeds convey no title, but simply ascertain by metes and bounds the interest of each.” This has been often cited since. See cases in 134 N. C., at p. 480, and in citations to that case in Anno. Ed.
In 21 A. and E., 1193, it is said that, “Both in voluntary and judicial partition the decree does not create or divest any title to or other right in the property, but merely severs the unity of possession and determines the share which each tenant is entitled to possess in severalty.”
Practically, though not expressly, the first decision in Carter v. White, 131 N. C., 14, has been reinstated in Weston v. Lumber Co., 162 N. C., 169-173. This last case has been cited with approval in Olds v. Cedar Works, 173 N. C., 166-167, and Stallings v. Walker, 176 N. C., 323.
But, independent of that, Carter v. White has no application to this case, for here Jones Bailey and his children were not parties to the former proceeding in partition, and are not bound thereby. They have not been deprived by the former proceeding of their interest in this land, and have a right to have their one-fifth interest now allotted and set apart; to be superimposed, so to speak, upon the former partition, which will result in taking one-twentieth from ~W. T. Justice, who was formerly allotted one-fourth of the land; and four-twentieths from James J. Bailey, who, claiming under the former partition, was entitled to three-fourths, which is now reduced by the claims of the heirs of Jones Bailey to three-fifths; while the former allotment of one-fourth, which Justice holds under the former partition, will be reduced to one-fifth.