Cutting v. Witcher

356 P.2d 1053, 225 Or. 234, 1960 Ore. LEXIS 658
CourtOregon Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 16, 1960
StatusPublished

This text of 356 P.2d 1053 (Cutting v. Witcher) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Oregon Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Cutting v. Witcher, 356 P.2d 1053, 225 Or. 234, 1960 Ore. LEXIS 658 (Or. 1960).

Opinion

WARNER, J.

This is a suit to remove a cloud upon the title of certain real and personal property situated in Douglas county, Oregon. It is the same property described in an assignment of vendees’ interest in the purchase contract to which we will later make reference. From a decree in favor of defendants, plaintiffs appeal.

On or about June 29, 1951, the plaintiffs, Cutting, husband and wife, acquired by purchase from defendant Don E. Witcher a White truck and a Gunderson trailer. For these vehicles they agreed to pay $9,000, payable in monthly installments of not less than $200 per month, with interest at six per cent on all deferred payments. We will hereinafter call this the Oregon [236]*236contract. Unless specifically indicated to the contrary, onr references to Cutting will be only to the plaintiff C. E. Cutting or Chester Cutting; and our references to Witcher will be only to the defendant Don E. Witcher.

To secure the payment of the purchase price obligation the Cuttings executed and delivered a chattel mortgage to Don Witcher which was a lien upon the truck and trailer. As further security, they delivered to him at the same time an assignment of their vendees’ interest or equity in a contract for the purchase and sale of several lots in the city of itoseburg, Douglas county, and items of personal property in the nature of household furniture and appliances in the house on said premises. We will from time to time refer to this instrument as the assignment. Both instruments were subsequently recorded in the office of the County Clerk of Douglas county.

It is the contention of plaintiffs that the debt secured by those instruments has been overpaid and by reason thereof the title to the property covered by the assignment should be relieved of the cloud created thereby. They also ask for an accounting of the alleged overpayment.

The defendants, to the contrary, asserted that a balance of approximately $4,400 remains due on the indebtedness and being the aggregate of the balances due on the Oregon contract and on a California contract to which we will later make reference. Defendants pray for a judgment in that amount and for a decree foreclosing the chattel mortgage and assignment which they claim stand as security for plaintiffs’ obligation under the Oregon and California contracts.

The trial court found that $3,893.68 remained due [237]*237from the Cuttings to Witcher and granted the foreclosure as prayed.

At the time of the purchase of the White truck and Gunderson trailer from Witcher, it was contemplated that the truck and trailer would be employed by Cutting in hauling logs for Witcher in his then Oregon operations and the compensation he derived from that enterprise would supply, in the main, the funds which Cutting needed for the payment of the $9,000 debt.

In October, 1951, the defendant Witcher moved to Healdsburg, California. Cutting, in June, 1952, followed Witcher and renewed his employment with him.

During the summer of 1952 it became apparent that the White truck would not meet the needs of Witcher’s California operation. By mutual agreement and because Cutting did not have the necessary credit, Don Witcher purchased a new Mack truck for $19,500 from Mack Motor Sales, San Francisco, California, under conditional sales contract. Cutting relinquished his title in the White truck to Witcher, who, in tarn, used it as a down payment of $5,000 upon the Mack truck. In addition, Witcher paid on the Mack deal various amounts as sales tax, finance, license and insurance charges, totaling $3,572.17. This amount was added to the purchase price.

The trial court found that the parties orally agreed that Cutting would pay Witcher $1,000 per month for eight months of the year and $250 per month during four winter months and when he had paid the full purchase price, the Mack truck “would be his.” As in the Oregon contract, payments would be made possible through Cutting’s operation of the Mack truck. Meantime, Witcher would continue as vendee under the conditional sales contract. This deal between Cutting and [238]*238Witcher is hereinafter referred to as the California contract. There is no evidence that the wife of C. E. Cutting was a party to the California agreement.

The defendants argue that the parties also agreed that the chattel mortgage and assignment executed as security for the $9,000 due under the Oregon contract was to continue as security for the new and larger sum owed by the Cuttings for the purchase price of the new Mack truck and that the Mack truck “be substituted for” and in place of the White truck acquired in the Oregon contract.

This construction of the California contract was categorically denied by the Cuttings. It is the position of plaintiffs that the parties agreed that Cutting was to eventually receive a contract of conditional sale on the Mack truck from Don Witcher, as vendor, and wherein Cutting would be the vendee, at such time as Cutting completed the payment of the $9,000 due under the Oregon contract. Although not precisely so stated by either Cutting or Witcher, it is a fair inference that the total amount to be paid by Cutting to Witcher under the California contract was to equal the total amount incurred by the latter to complete his ownership in the Mack truck.

The trial court in holding for the defendant Witcher decided as a matter of fact that the parties had orally agreed that the security for the Oregon contract was to become the security for the California contract.

Plaintiffs treat the California contract as one of conditional sale and unenforceable under the law of that state because of noncompliance with Civil Code of California, § 2982. They argue that all payments made to Witcher under the California contract should be applied as a further credit to the Oregon contract. [239]*239This, if done, would result in an over-payment, entitling plaintiffs to a decree as prayed for in their complaint.

For reasons which will presently appear, we do not find the oral California agreement amenable to the provisions of § 2982, supra, of the California Code.

Assuming the existence of a valid and enforceable contract between the parties in respect to the Mack truck, the most important question in the matter at bar is whether Witcher under the California agreement was protected by the Oregon security.

There is no controversy between Cutting and Witcher that: (1) Witcher agreed to buy, as vendee, the Mack truck on a conditional sales contract at certain monthly payments from the Mack Company; (2) Witcher was to assign his interest in this sales contract to Cutting when and if Cutting completed payments in a certain amount; and (3) Cutting was also bound to complete his payments under the Oregon contract. Cutting further contends that upon completion of the Oregon payments, Witcher would then assign his vendee’s interest in the conditional sales contract to Cutting. We accept this construction of the California agreement.

Cutting does not agree that the Oregon security assignment was extended to protect this California contract.

The transcript of testimony is relatively short. From Cutting and Witcher we derive our sole information concerning the California agreement. Both are vague in their memories about certain details relating to the formulation of their final agreement and Witcher, particularly, about the relationship, if any, of the Oregon contract to the California contract.

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Bluebook (online)
356 P.2d 1053, 225 Or. 234, 1960 Ore. LEXIS 658, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/cutting-v-witcher-or-1960.