Boudreaux v. Lower Terrebonne Refining & Mfg. Co.

53 So. 456, 53 So. 460, 127 La. 98, 1910 La. LEXIS 773
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedJune 10, 1910
DocketNo. 17,854
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 53 So. 456 (Boudreaux v. Lower Terrebonne Refining & Mfg. Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Boudreaux v. Lower Terrebonne Refining & Mfg. Co., 53 So. 456, 53 So. 460, 127 La. 98, 1910 La. LEXIS 773 (La. 1910).

Opinion

PROVOSTY, J.

Alfred Boudreaux died July 28, 1898, leaving a widow and ten children, eight of whom were minors between the ages of three and eighteen, and leaving property consisting of a sugar plantation, inventoried at $37,100; a half interest in a store, inventoried at $750; a tract of land, inventoried at $2,000; another tract, inventoried at $50; a half interest in another tract, inventoried at $50; and household furniture, inventoried at $250; and leaving a debt of $5,100, which he had recently contracted in the purchase of machinery and mules for the plantation, and other debts to the amount of $1,900. Louis Bush’s Sons were the commission merchants of the plantation.

Mrs. Boudreaux knew little, or nothing, of business, and could understand the English language but imperfectly, and barely speak it. There was a cane crop under way. Louis Bush’s Sons, the commission merchants of the plantation, sent word to Ijer that she ought to open the succession of her husband. She, accordingly, presented a petition to the court, asking that she be recognized as the surviving widow in community of her deceased husband, and, as such, owner of one half of his estate and usufructuary of the other half, ánd that her children be recognized as the legal and only heirs, and that she and they be .sent into possession, and that she be recognized and confirmed as their natural tutrix. After an inventory had been made, and a certificate of its amount recorded, so as to preserve the legal mortgage of the minors upon the property of their tutrix, the court made an order accordingly.

The legal situation then was that Mrs. Boudreaux, as survivor in community, was owner of one undivided half of the inventoried property, and usufructuary of the other half; and that her children were owners of the naked ownership of this other half; and that she and her children, together, were in possession of the said property; and that she was unconditional debtor of one half of the debts left by her husband (all of which were community debts), and her children debtors of the other half of said debts, each for his or her virile share, the liability of the major heirs being absolute, and that of the minors being subject to the benefit of inventory; and that the succession was closed. Mayronne v. Waggaman, 30 La. Ann. 974; Soye v. Price, 30 La. Ann. 93.

Louis Bush’s Sons went on making advances to the plantation for bringing to maturity and harvesting the growing crops and for the living expenses of the family. The result of the operations of the year did not enable Mrs. Boudreaux to reduce the inr debtedness existing at the time she took charge. How to meet this indebtedness, and what to do with the plantation, and how to provide for the maintenance of herself and children and for the education of her children, was the problem she found herself confronted with. Whatever she did, she would have to provide for the maintenance and education of her children; for this was an obligation imposed upon her by law, and by her own maternal feelings as well. For discharging this obligation, all, and more than all, she would ever receive from the usufruct of the share of the children would be required. This usufruct, therefore, when coupled with this obligation, was a mere barren right.

This being the situation, she presented a petition to the court, individually and as tutrix of her minor children, in which she alleged that:

“As tutrix of her children she is administering the estate of her late husband, which consists principally of the Front 'Lawn plantation (which she describes); that said property is a valuable sugar plantation and was cultivated as such by her late husband, Alfred Boudreaux, for a number of years up to the time of his death, which occurred in July, 1898; that [104]*104Since said date your petitioner has been cultivating and operating said plantation . in her aforesaid capacity, and she desires to continue its cultivation, as she is entirely dependent on its profits and revenues to pay the debts of her late husband, to support herself and family, and to maintain and educate her said minor children; that the debts due by her late husband, which she is anxious to discharge, are $4,000 due on a double effect, and $1,100 due on a lot of mules; that, owing to the unprecedented shortage in the crop of last year, the said plantation made no money, and she is without the necessary cash to pay these debts and to continue the planting of crops for the present year, and it is necessary, therefore, for her to borrow the necessary money; that the Only security she has to offer is a mortgage on her undivided half interest in the plantation above described, the other half being owned jointly by all her children, including two of age; that it will require an outlay of at least $12,000 in money and necessary supplies to carry on said plantation and make a crop this present year; that she has applied to a commission merchant, who is willing to lend her the said' amount, provided a first mortgage, with pledge and privilege on the crop of the present year, can be given on the whole property, said money lender being unwilling to lend the necessary amount on a mortgage given on an undivided interest in said property.”

She then alleges her willingness to mortgage her half of said plantation, and the willingness of her two major children to mortgage their interest; that it is to the evident advantage of the minors and, in fact, absolutely necessary, that their interest should be similarly mortgaged; that the advances can be obtained only on the condition that a first mortgage on the entire property be given; and that it is therefore absolutely necessary that the legal mortgage of the minors upon her half of said plantation should be postponed to the said mortgage thus to be given. She prayed accordingly, and that a family meeting be held to give advice in the premises.

The family meeting was duly held, and it recommended that authority be granted to Mrs. Boudreaux, tutrix, as prayed for, with this qualification: “That the interest of each minor be mortgaged for his or her proportionate share of said amount, to wit,” $600. The tutrix was authorized to execute the necessary act “with the usual conservatory clauses” for borrowing the money.

What was meant by these “usual conservatory clauses” is not explained; but, on March 10, 1899, Mrs. Boudreaux, individually and as tutrix, and her two major children, executed three notes for $4,000 each, payable, respectively, November 1, December 1, 1899, and January 1, 1900, with 8 per cent, interest from date, and, to secure same, gave a mortgage on the Front ¡Lawn plantation; and Mrs. Boudreaux, as tutrix, postponed the minors’ legal mortgage upon her half of the plantation to the mortgage thus given. Mrs. Boudreaux mortgaged her undivided half, and each of the children, both the majors and the minors, his or her one-twentieth interest.

The act contained all the clauses usual in acts between planter and commission merchant for advances; that is to say, it recites that the mortgagors, desiring to obtain advances for the cultivation of the said plantation, pledge the crops and obligate themselves to ship them to the commission merchant, and authorize the latter to attribute the proceeds of the crop to the payment of the debts on open accounts, so that any balance that may be due shall be due on the notes, etc. 'The proceedings by which Mrs. Boudreaux was authorized to act in1 the premises for her minor children are specially referred to and made part of the act. The proceedings were duly homologated.

What was the result or outcome of the crop of 1899, the record does not show.

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Bluebook (online)
53 So. 456, 53 So. 460, 127 La. 98, 1910 La. LEXIS 773, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/boudreaux-v-lower-terrebonne-refining-mfg-co-la-1910.