Badger Oil Co. v. Clay

1921 OK 190, 200 P. 433, 83 Okla. 25, 1921 Okla. LEXIS 286
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedMay 24, 1921
Docket10114
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 1921 OK 190 (Badger Oil Co. v. Clay) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Badger Oil Co. v. Clay, 1921 OK 190, 200 P. 433, 83 Okla. 25, 1921 Okla. LEXIS 286 (Okla. 1921).

Opinion

McNEILL, J.

This action was commenced in the district court of Grady eounty by R. P. Clay against the Badger Oil Company, to recover a broker’s commission in the sum of $5,000. The allegations of the petition were that the Badger Oil Company employed the plaintiff to find a purchaser of its interest in an oil lease for the sum of $100,000, and agreed to pay a commission of five per cent. The petition alleged that, pursuant to said, agreement, plaintiff negotiated the sale of the property and sold ’the same to C. N. Has-kell for the Sinclair Oil & Gas Company, but defendant refused to convey title pursuant to said contract and refused to deliver title for examination and failed and refused to carry out said contract of sale; that the purchaser to whom the plaintiff sold the property was ready, willing, and able to buy the property and pay therefor.

To this petition, the defendant answered, admitting it was a corporation, and objected *26 to the jurisdiction of the court for the reason it was a domestic corporation with its piace of business :.n Garfield comity, and ivas not properly sued in Grady county. Further answering, it admitted it had authorized Clay to find a purchaser for an interest in the o:l and gas lease, and was able and willing at all times to sell said lease upon the terms and conditions it had authorized Clay to sell the same, but the purchaser refused to carry out the terms of said contract, üaid case was tried before a jury, and the jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff and against the defendant for the sum of $5,000. From said judgment, the Badger Oil Company has appealed.

For convenience, the parties will be referred to in the same position they occupied in the trial court.

The defendant’s assignments Nos. 1, 2, 6, and 7 are submitted as follows: That under no phase of this case, under the issues as framed, is plaintiff entitled to recover. This simply goes to the question of whether there is any evidence reasonably tending to support the verdict of the jury.

The evidence in the case is conflicting, and in determining whether there is any evidence reasonably tending to support the verdict of the jury, it is unnecessary to consider the evidence that contradicts the evidence of the plaintiff, hut will the evidence, most favorable to the plaintiff, if believed by the jury, -support the verdict? There is evidence in the record that the Sinclair Oil & Gas Company had agreed to purchase the interest of the defendant in the lease for $100,000. The parties met in Tulsa for the purpose of consummating the sale, and Mr. Chandler, the attorney for the Sinclair Oil & Gas Company, refused to approve the title as submitted, it appearing there was a suit pending in Creek county and one threatened to be filed which would materially affect defen dant’s title. There is evidence that after Mr. Chandler made his report adverse to defendant’s title the parties met in Mr. Has-kell’s office and discussed the question of supplying what purported to be the defects in the title by affidavit, and Mr. Haskell was to proceed to procure the necessary affidavits. There is some evidence that Mr. Has-kell made arrangements to procure said affidavits and did procure them, and it was testified to without objection that the Sinclair Oil & Gas Company then expressed its willingness to accept the title and consummate the deal. The plaintiff wired the defendant company to this effect at their office at Enid, and talked to -the defendant’s officers and notified them that the Sinclair Oil & Gas Company was ready, able, and willing to consummate said deal and requested they come to Tulsa and complete said sale, but they refused to come to Tulsa to consummate said deal and refused to have anything further to do with the sale.

Plaintiff contends the difficulty arose by Mr. Athey, the president of the Badger Oil Company, demanding one-half of the commission from plaintiff, or. '$2.500, which pla ntiff refused to give, and Mr. Athey stat ed if plaintiff refused to give him $2,500, or one-half of the commission, that he, Mr Athey, as president, would refuse to make the sale. The evidence regarding these transactions is conflicting, but there is evidence in the case to support the material allegations of the petition, and to support a verdict for the plaintiff. The facts bring the case almost squarely within the facts of the case of Strickland v. Palmer, 70 Oklahoma, 172 Pac. 932, where this court stated:

“In an action for a commission for the leasing of some land for oil and gas purposes, it is no defense that the agent did not procure a written lease or contract, where the lessor failed to comply with his contract, and the nonprocurement of the contract or lease was due to Ms own act.”

Defendant next argues that the court erred in refusing to give instructions Nos. 1, 2, 3. 4, and 8 requested by the defendant. Instruction No. tT, requested by defendant, was covered by instruction No. 4, given by the court. Instruction No. 3, requested by defendant, was substantially the same as instruction No. 3, given by the court. Instruction No. 4 was substantially the same as instruction No. 4, given -by the court. This court, in the case of Felt v. Westlake, 68 Oklahoma, 174 Pac. 1041, stated as follows:

“The refusal of defendant’s requested in-stiAietions was not error, where, in so far as they correctly stated the law, the principles were covered by the instructions given.”

Instruction No. 2, requested by plaintiff in error, was to the effect that if plaintiff knew or learned that the lease he was attempting to sell was involved in litigation and if the sale failed by reason of the title or because the title was in litigation, the plaintiff could not recover. There was no such issue in the trial of this case. No attempt was made by plaintiff to recover upon such a theory, no evidence was introduced -upon which such an instruction could have been founded, and the court submitted no instruction that would authorize the plaintiff to recover on such a theory; therefore it was not error for the court to refuse said instructions.

Instruction No. 5, requested by plaintiff in error, was an instruction regarding the defect in title. The question of title was not an is *27 sue in the case, and it was not error to refuse this instruction.

Plaintiff in error nest complained that instructions Nos. 5 and 5%, given by the court, were erroneous. Instruction No. 5 instructed the jury that a party who lists property with a broker for sale is presumed to furnish good and merchantable title to the same, unless there is a special agreement to the contrary. As an abstract proposition this instruction no doubt correctly states the law; although the question of title was not involVed, the giving of said instruction would not require a reversal unless the same was prejudicial. There was no instruction authorizing the jury to find for the plaintiff and against the defendant upon the theory that defendant’s title was defective. There was evidence that might justify the 'giving of said instruction, not upon the theory that the plaintiff could recover upon that theory, but because the evidence disclosed the abstract was submitted and the title objected to for certain reasons, and the parties thereafter supplied the defects in the title. ■Whether it was a proper instruction or not, is unnecessary to determine, but it certainly was not a prejudicial instruction. Instruction No.

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Bluebook (online)
1921 OK 190, 200 P. 433, 83 Okla. 25, 1921 Okla. LEXIS 286, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/badger-oil-co-v-clay-okla-1921.