Court Opinion

ID: 9681523
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 07:52:01.046499+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:34.331579
License: Public Domain

On Motions for Rehearing
Ground XII of the defendants’ motion is that the evidence shows as a matter of law that plaintiffs did not use diligence to serve defendants Nora and Mayme with process for notice. Our original opinion went no further than the holding that the matter of diligence was at least a question of fact.
Ground 4 of the plaintiffs’ motion for rehearing assigns error to our holding that the filing of this suit did not stop the statutes of adverse possession from running against defendants Nora and Mayme, and Ground '5 assigns error to the holding just noted, concerning the effect of the evidence about diligence.
We overrule Ground 4 of the plaintiffs’ motion. We remain of the opinion, for the reasons stated in our originál opinion, that the meaning of the term “adverse suit” in Art. 5514, R.S.1925, includes a requirement of continuous exercise of diligence by the plaintiffs to serve process for notice on the defendants, but we add the following comments, pertaining to arguments made in the plaintiffs’ motion. Plaintiffs say that Art. 5514 is not a limitation statute and so decisions like Hughes v. McClatchy, Tex.Civ.App., 242 S.W.2d 799, which we cited, do not apply because these construe limitation statutes. Plaintiffs also say that we have added' a requirement to Art. 5514 and they say further that this statute ought to be construed strictly. The question, of course, is simply what the term “adverse suit” in Art. 5514 means, and it seems to us that our conclusion about the necessity of continuous diligence squares with the word “adverse”. And while Art. 5514, considered alone, only defines peaceable possession, the term peaceable possession is an element of the statutes of .adverse possession, and this fact authorizes us to view Art. 5514 as. a limitation statute, .if that fact be of any significance. Plaintiffs say that the suit is adverse within the meaning of Art. 5514 if. only “(a) the suit be filed with a good faith intention that the same be prosecuted to judgment and (b) that it.be prosecuted to judgment in good faith following its filing; and that-r-diligence in the service of citation — is immaterial.” We see no reason for distinguishing between a suit filed with no intention to prosecute and on? filed with an intention to prosecute which, however, is suspended and put aside for a substantial time; and that is what happened here.
We sustain defendants’ Ground XII and overrule plaintiffs’ Ground 5. The facts are stated in another paper and need not be repeated. From these we conclude that when this suit was filed the defendants Anna, Nora, and Mayme had their residence at 538.. Pine Street, in Beaumont, and. that this place, continued thereafter to be the residence of defendants Anna and Nora down to the trial of this cause and the residence of the defendant Mayme until her death in March, 1946. These facts could have been determined easily and quickly; there is no evidence that any of the defendants attempted to evade service or to mislead officers attempting to serve process. It was a question of fact as to how much time defendants Nora and Mayme did spend at their residence; but during the period beginning with the letter of plaintiffs’ lawyer, dated August 29, 1941, to the lawyer at Houma, Louisiana, concerning the second non-resident notice for service (and plaintiffs’ lawyer never heard from this man) down to the time of the-defendant Mayme’s death in March, 1946,, *471the plaintiffs did'nothing to effect service on either defendant Mayme or on defendant Nora, and aftér Mayme’s -death they did nothing to effect service on-Nora until the issuance of- a citation- to said defendant on November 5, 1948. Since these two defendants did have a residence as stated, arid since this could have been ■ easily and quickly located by the plaintiffs if - plaintiffs did not know it (and- we note that every citation issued in the -cause except the two non-resident notices of May, 1941, was procured by the same one of plaintiffs’ lawyers and was sent by him to Jefferson County for service at this very address), it seems to us that the exercise of diligence during the period of years when no effort to serve process was made would have effected personal service on said defendants Nora and Mayme before Mayme’s death and certainly would have effected service on defendant Nora after the amendment of Rule 106, Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, effective December 31, 1947, authorized substituted service. The plaintiffs finally did resort to the latter rule to effect service on defendant Nora. Accordingly, we hold that plaintiffs did not use diligence to effect service on -defendants Mayme and Nora after August 29, 1941. We hold, further, that the explanation given by plaintiffs’ lawyer for the suspension of efforts between August 29, 1941, and November 5, 1948, was legally insufficient to excuse the failure of diligence, and as our additional findings show, it really did not cover a material part of the period involved. We hold further that the military service of two of plaintiffs’ present counsel during a part of this period of suspension does not affect the question of diligence. One of these two did not come into the record until -the intervention of Stubbs, Executor, et al., on1 January 28, 1949. The other was only one of plaintiffs’ original counsel of record, and ever since the suit was filed the -plaintiffs have had a lawyer who resided at the town where the trial court sits and who attended to the matter of effecting service of-process on defendants and to other- proceedings in the cause, not only before but also after ■the military sérvice of both of the other lawyers came to an - end.
In. so holding, we are charging the plaintiffs with the conduct of the lawyer who madé the efforts to effect service on defendants-. He was counsel of record and is presumed to have acted with authority. T.R. 10; S.Tex.Jur. 449 (Sec. 45). But we are entirely satisfied that the suspension of this lawyer’s efforts to effect service between August 29, 1941, and November 5, • 1948, reflects in fact the attitude and -position of- the plaintiffs- themselves and does' not show negligence on the part of this lawyer of plaintiffs.
It is assigned as error in Grounds XIII and XIV of defendants’ motion for rehearing that the evidence shows as a matter of law that by virtue of Fregia’s possession, the defendant Nora had acquired title under the five-year statute to one-half of the land in suit, less the 50 acres in the northwest corner. On the other hand, Ground 6 of the plaintiffs’ motion assigns as error that Fregia’s possession of the Coons-Pickett field after plaintiffs’ tenant Lloyd moved to Hull.in 1941 did not give notice of adverse claim by the defendants and did not raise the question of fact, whether this possession vested any title in defendants.
We overrule defendants’ Grounds XIII and XIV. This contention depends on the effect of Fregia’s testimony respecting his possession since the suit was filed, and we hold that Fregia’s' testimony raised only questions of fact, whether his possession had vested any title in defendant Nora. Most of the evidence to be considered has been separately stated. That of Paul 'Flowers raised -a question -as to when Fregia’s possession of the- Coons-Pickett field became - exclusive. Then, Fregia’s 'testimony about Lloyd’s -conduct raised a question - as to how long Fregia’s use of the Coons-Pickett field continued to be exclusive. Then, there is some uncertainty in Fregia’s testimony as to whether a gate in the fence between Lloyd’s tract and the Coons-Pickett field -had remained *472closed since Fregia had • had possession, and this circumstance had some bearing on whether Fregia’s use of the Coons-Pickett field was exclusive. See: • S.F. 808, 813, 816. Then, there is no confirmation of Fregia’s testimony concerning his use of the Coons-Pickett field. All circumstances considered Fregia’s testimony only raised questions of fact for the jury, as stated.
We also overrule Ground 6 of the plaintiffs’ motion. The jury were authorized to find that -immediately after Lloyd moved to Hull' in September, 1941, ■Fregia, as tenant of the defendants under a written lease ending December 17, 1942, took possession of the Coons-Pickett field ¿rid has ever since held this possession as defendants’ tenant, using the field .as a pasture, and that this possession was exclusive at' least down to the time ' Lloyd took down "thé fence between his tract arid Fregia’s; and the jury were authorized to find that Lloyd did this in 1949, more than five years after Fregia extended the defendants’ possession by taking possession of the Coons-Pickett field. It is not material that there is a gap in time between Fregia’s lease ending December 17, 1942, and the next, made in 1946, because, the jury could have found that he.simply held over and remained in possession under the same arrangement with defendants. The defendants claimed title to the■■ land in suit under a recorded deed and in Houston Oil Company v. Niles, Tex.Com.App., 255 S.W. 604, at page 608, it is said: “The possession of any part of the league; by Hare was the possession of the defendants or those under whom they claim until such time as Hare terminated the tenancy in the manner recognized by law.” So, Fregia’s possession of the Coons-Pickett field, being that of a stranger to the plaintiffs and, in fact, a tenant of the defendants, gave notice of the defendants’ claim whether Fregia extended the Coons-Pickett field or not and regardless of what-Fregia did to the fence about this field; but the'jury ■could have found that his repairs-to this fence were ’so material as to amount to a reconstruction of the fence. The rule.- of Coleman v. Waddell, 151 Tex. 337, 249 S. W.2d 912, is satisfied, in so far as- it applies to this case. Plaintiffs argue that the record owner could assume, after the-expiration of the lease ending on -December 17, 1942, that Fregia held possession of the Coons-Pickett field for himself, as a mere encroachment from his own land, but this contention ' is inconsistent with the rules concerning the effect of possession as notice and the rules that a tenant .cannot dispute his. landlord’s right to possession and that his attornment to a stranger ordinarily -does not dispossess the landlord. See Houston, Oil Company v. Niles, supra.
Concerning Ground 2 of plaintiffs’ motion, which we overrule: We meant to-hold that the-recitation of heirship in Yon .Rosenberg’g.deed to Johnson was not competent under. Art. 3597a because it was-only -a' conclusion and was not the statement bf facts required by that statute.. Plaintiffs argue that by the word “Deed Records”- in Art. 3597a the Legislature-meant simply the records- of the County ■Clerk, .but this gives no effect to the word “deed!’, and.-.we overrule the contention. We-,withdraw our statement concerning the-Clerk’s authority -to maintain a. separate record for powers of attorney because it .was .unnecessary. Art. 3597a requires-the-instrument to be recorded in the deed, records, and an instrument shown to be recorded in- a record called a power of attorney record has not been shown. to be recorded,in a deed record, at least with sufficient certainty to justify the use of' recitations .of facts under Art. 3597a. For the title of the record implies that powers of attorney are recorded there, and these • might, as well- be powers to make mortgages -or to. do other acts which have no-connection with deeds or with instruments • having the effect of deeds. For the present, then, we are only holding that the evidence does' not make Art. 3597a applicable to the recitations -concerning heir-ship in the po.wer of attorney from Margarethe Laemmer, et al. to W. Von Rosenberg.
*473We overrule Ground 7 of the plaintiffs’ motion and, in consequence, now overrule plaintiffs’ counterpoint .10, which we. left undetermined in our original opinion. There is evidence that the pasture which Bruce surveyed was the Markantell-pasture which Fregia was occupying when the suit was filed. Thus Bruce said that this pasture which he surveyed ’ was east of and adjoining to Fregia’s place, and when the size of the pasture surveyed by Bruce is considered, it is apparent that it was the one Fregia had taken possession-of under, and following Markantell. Furthermore, the revised field notes to which Bruce testified (S.F. 941, et seq.) delimited land .within the fence of this, pasture. Bruce’s first set of notes had at.one place extended a little beyond the pasture fence( but the revised notes corrected this. Finally, Bruce’s field/notes were based on ar-, tificial monuments, that is, trees which he had marked; 'and he said that if these trees were still standing a surveyor could go on the ground and find the , survey Bruce had made. It seems clear, for reasons stated in our original- opinion, that-most, if not all, of Bruce’s survey was on the land in suit, and this being so''a judgment awarding the pasture' could have been drawn by describing the tract''awarded as that part of' Bruce’s survey within the land in suit, giving 'Bruce’s revised field notes and giving a description of the land in suit.' The fact that Bruce did not relate his field notes on to the lines of the Eigén-eaur survey does not make his field fiotes patently insufficient as a description 'because he related these field notes to .marked trees.
We have considered the question, whether the evidence shows, as a matter of law that defendants Anna and Nora had title by adverse possession to the land in the survey which is described by Bruce’s field notes but have concluded that this, too, raised only questions for the jury.
It is unnecessary to comment on other grounds of plaintiffs’ and defendants’ motions for rehearing, and except as noted above, these motions are overruled. We make the following rulings concerning plaintiffs’ motion to correct findings: Ground 1 'is' sustained ''except that the course is 46½°. The language quoted in Grounds 2 and 3 has been changed. Ground 4 is sustained. Ground S is overruled. It is determined by our action on Ground XII of defendants’ motion and Ground 5 of plaintiffs’ motion.
Our original judgment remains-& effect.