Court Opinion

ID: 9827803
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 17:52:14.840193+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:42:37.133243
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
As counsel has severely challenged the accuracy of this court’s conclusions in respect to special issues submitted and their effect, we here copy them, as well as the answers, in full, so there can be no mistake as to what issues only were submitted, and what answers were given, and their effect, to wit:
“First question: Did Mr. McHenry represent to Mr. Mason while upon the land and before Mr. Mason bought the land that said land in its entirety was inclosed with a barb wire fence, and that there were forty acres of land within such in closure and under such fence? Answer: Yes.
“Second question: Were such statements as you have found Mr. McHenry made to Mr. Mason in your answer to the first question stated as a fact or were they the mere expression of an opinion? Answer: As expression of opinion.
“Third question: Did Mr. McHenry represent to Mr. Mason while on the land and before Mr. Mason bought it that there were only four or five acres, or not more than four or five acres, that were top high to water? Answer: Yes.
“Fourth question: Were such statements as you have found that Mr. McHenry made to Mr. Mason in answer to the third question stated as a fact, or as the mere expression of an opinion? Answer: As a fact.
“Sixth: Was the defendant, Calvin Mason, in the spring of 1913 and at the time he cleared the land in possession of such facts as would have put a reasonable prudent man upon such inquiry as would have led to a discovery of the quantity of land too high to water? Answer: Yes.”
*571[4] In this case the appellant “in open court admitted all the allegations of plaintiff’s petition except in so far as they may be avoided by the plea of failure of consideration as presented to the jury, in order to obtain the benefit of the opening and closing of the testimony.” Smith v. Bank, 74 Tex. 541, 12 S. W. 221; Meade v. Logan, 110 S. W. 189; Workman v. Ray, 180 S. W. 291. It is held in Berry Bros v. Fairbanks, Morse & Co., 51 Tex. Civ. App. 561, 112 S. W. 429.
“The contemplation of the rule is that the admission relieves the appellees of proving the case, and to allow them to recover to the extent of the claim made in their pleadings. Sanders v. Bridges, 67 Tex. 93, 2 S. W. 663. The admission reaches to the entire cause of action pleaded, and appellants cannot question failure to offer evidence on any material allegation. Taylor v. Reynolds (Tex. Civ. App.) 105 S. W. 65.”
As the defense was by him limited to the sole one of failure of consideration, we must again search the pleading, evidence, and findings of the jury relating thereto. There is no claim or proof of fraud as a fact, but simply based upon representations made to him at the time of the inspection of the land when he was present, upon which he says he relied, and for that reason the consideration failed. There is no effort to set aside the sale upon the ground of mutual mistake of the parties, if after this great lapse of time such a plea would be available. under the facts in this ease. There was nothing done or said to appellant at the time, or representation made to him, but what was obvious to him just as much so as it was to the agent who was showing him the land. All the representations made are found by the jury to be made as “expressions of opinion,” except in i-espect to the answer to the third question, in which the answer as shown is that Mc-Henry represented that there were only four or five acres, or not more than four or five acres, that were too high to water, made “as a fact.”
In addition to what appellant said about the misrepresentations made to him in regard to the number of acres that could not be irrigated, upon which he relied, Mr. Kector T. Mason, son of appellant, testified:
“ * * * I joined them, and they were starting to the fence, and I started the same way, and they stopped and looked around, and Mr. McHenry indicated a place around there and says, ‘That is a beautiful building site,’ and says, ‘That is too high to irrigate.’ And my father asked him how much there was, and he said, ‘Well, I couldn’t say exactly,’ and my father said, ‘About three or four acres?’ and he hesitated. ‘Well,’ he says, ‘is it less than four or five acres?’ and Mr. McHenry said ‘Yes.’ ”
Cross-examination:
“Mr. McHenry told my father he didn’t know how many acres there were.
“Q. And your father in the question plainly estimated it as being three or four acres, and Mr. McHenry’s reply was not more than four or five? A. No, sir; that was not the way it was. My father’s question was three or four acres, and Mr. McHenry hesitated, and said he couldn’t say exactly, and my father said ‘Is it less than four or five?’ — I oefieve were his exact words — ‘not more than four or five, Mr. McHenry?’ and he said ‘No.’”
[5-7] We are giving appellant the benefit of his own witness on the point, which, whether made as a fact or as an opinion, it looks as much the testimony of appellant as of McHenry, for he was led up to make the statement by appellant himself, who knew the circumstances under which it was made. It was clearly not made or intended to be made as a false statement, nor intended to thereby falsely induce the buyer to purchase on account of such representations. Watson v. Baker, 71 Tex. 739, 9 S. W. 867. There is no finding of the jury nor a word of evidence to show, as said in White v. Peters, 185 S. W. 660, the statement, though in the form of an opinion by one who knows the facts, makes the opinion a sham and a fraud. In such a case there would be a misconception of a fact, but would not be a fraud, where the party situated as appellant was, observing and making his own examination and inspection, his son being with him, saw and knew the cir-cumstancfes under which McHenry, the agent, was speaking, and he himself so situated as to see and observe the situation for himself and to form his own opinion and judgment. This is not a case where the buyer was wholly induced to purchase and so induced by the misrepresentations of fact and misled by a false and fraudulent representation, and thereby induced to rely upon the same and to make the purchase. There are no specific allegations of fraud, as is usually required in pleadings, that fraud must be alleged as well as proven, though appellant contends that he has pleaded the facts fully to show fraud. No issue of fraud per se was submitted to the jury. In support of the court’s judgment we must assume that it found there was not, as an examination of the record discloses no fraud as a fact committed. To constitute fraud it required more than to find the representations were made as “a fact,” but further that £hey were made more than as an expression of an opinion or belief, and under such circumstances as to amount to a positive assertion of a fact which must have been false. Appellant must have wholly relied on it and must thereby have been induced to purchase the land. Therefore, if this statement made to appellant, as from the surrounding circumstances, shows it to have been made, whether you call it as “a fact” or not, to express a mere opinion made categorically in reply to appellant’s questions, when making his own in-*572spectio'n and seeing everything the agent saw, and made as the mere expression of an opinion with no intent to deceive, under the circumstances it constituted no fraud. Hawkins v. Wells, 17 Tex. Civ. App. 360, 43 S. W. 818.
Appellant is correct in his statement as well as the citation Friemel v. Coker, 218 S. W. 1108, to the effect that, where there is no request for the submission of an issue, the court may find thereon himself.
It will also be assumed that the court found on such facts necessary to support the judgment when the jury failed to find all necessary material facts. That is precisely what has been done here, and we have looked to the record and quoted from appellant’s own testimony, which supports, the judgment of the trial court.
There is no new proposition of law presented, or other valid reason given that entitles appellant to a rehearing, and the motion is overruled.