Eysenbach v. Naharkey

1926 OK 347, 246 P. 603, 114 Okla. 217, 1926 Okla. LEXIS 990
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedApril 13, 1926
Docket13931
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 1926 OK 347 (Eysenbach v. Naharkey) 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
Eysenbach v. Naharkey, 1926 OK 347, 246 P. 603, 114 Okla. 217, 1926 Okla. LEXIS 990 (Okla. 1926).

Opinion

BRANSON, Y. C. J.

The motion to modify the opinion filed December 16, 1924, in effect represents for further consideration the entire record, ¡and the positions of the respective parties.

iSammie Naharkey sued W. E. Hardesty in the district court of Tulsa county, alleging that he was the legal and equitable owner of an undivided three-fourths interest in the east half of the northeast quarter of the southwest quartér; and the east half of the southeast quarter of the southwest quarter of section twenty-six (26) township nineteen (19) north, range twelve (12) east, in said county.

O. K. Eysenbach and Bessie C. Eysenbach had soldi the said described land to the said defendant, W. E. Hardesty, by warranty deed. To defend their warranty, they intervened, and issues were joined between the plaintiff and defendant, ¡as well as between the defendant and the interveners, the Eys-enbachs.

Judgmnt was rendered in the district court in iavor of the plaintiff, for the recovery of the interest in said land sued for, to wit, a three-fourths interest; in favor of Hardesty ¡against interveners Eysenbachs, on their warranty for rentals, royalties, and profits arising from the land, and for attorney’s fee for an attorney employed by the defendant Hardesty. Petition in error is filed herein by the Eysenbachs, and also a petition in error as filed by the defendant Hardesty. These petitions in error call in question the correctness of the judgment of the trial court in all its particulars.

The motion now before the court, filed by attorneys for the plaintiff, Sammie Na-harkey, waives the rentals, royalties, and bonuses sought and recovered by the judgment of the lower court; so the controversy is, first, as to rhe interest, if any, the plaintiff was entitled to recover in and to the land; second, the amount of recovery by the defendant Hardesty against the interveners, the Eysenbachs, on the warranty; and third, whether Hardesty could recover reasonable attorney fees for an attorney employed by himself.

The facts in this case are considerably involved. A succinct and brief statement Is more conducive to clarity than details, and a review of the entire record convinces us that there were errors in th original opinion which are apparent under the conclusions of law reached. The original opinion must, *218 therefore, be withdrawn and our conclusions set forth herein substituted in lieu thereof.

The said land particularly described in plaintiff’s petition is 40 acres. It was once the property of one Millie Naharkey. She became the owner thereof by reason of the fact that she was a citizen by blood of the Creek Nation, and it was allotted and conveyed to her during' her lifetime, by a patent duly issued by the Creek Nation and the government of the United States, acting- under authority of the numerous acts of Congress directing the enrollment and allotment of lands belonging to the Creek Tribe of Indians among the citizens of said tribe. She was the wife of Moses Nahar-key. She died in the year 1901, and at a time when the Creek law of descent and distribution governed the devolution of her said land, placed in effect by the Original Creek Agreement of March 1, 1901. She was survived by her husband, Moses Naharkey, and her son, Sammie Naharkey (the plaintiff herein). Under said Creek law, Moses, the husband, took the fee to, one-half of said land, and Sammie the fee to the other one-half. Moses thereafter married a second wife, in the person of Martha Naharkey (nee Red), also a full-blood citizen of the Creek Nation. To this latter marriage a child was born, in the year 1904, which child was named Millie. It is referred to in the briefs as “Little Millie,” to distinguish this child from the first wife of Moses. In the year 19Ó5, .Moses was the owner oí an undivided half of the said land so inherited as above set .out, and was in said year the husband of the said Martha, his second wife, and the father of the said “Little Millie.” In said last-named year, Moses died intestate, and at that time the law of descent and distribution, as well as the law governing the rights of a widow in lands of a deceased husband, as placed in force by the Act of Congress of May 2, 1890, was the law of the forum, and governed the devolution of the interest the said Moses Naharkey owned in the said 40 acres of land.

For the reasons hereinafter given, we reach the conclusion that said Martha Na-harkey, the second wife, and Sammie Nahar-key, the son of the first wife, Millie, and “Little Millie,” the daughter of the second wife, Martha, each inherited from Moses his interest in the said 40 acres, share and share alike. That is to say, Moses having died seized of an undivided half, Martha took one-third thereof, or one-sixth, Sammie took one-third thereof, or one-sixth, and “Little Millie” took one-third thereof, or one-sixth. Having reached this conclusion, the plaintiff, Sammie Naharkey, was the owner of one-half of the said 40 acres, which he inherited di--rectly from his mother, Millie, and one-sixtn of the said 40 acres, which he inherited from his father,'Moses. That is to say, if he was entitled to recover, as we conclude he was,, his recovery was’ limited to one-half, plus one-sixth, which is two-thirds, instead of the three-fourths prayed in his petition.

The above • conclusion is correct, if as a matter of law the said Martha took a child’s part in the estate of her husband, Moses, upon his death in 1905: Whether or not she took this interest revolves around the contention as to whether section 2599 of Mansfield’s Digest of the Statutes of Arkansas was x>art of the law of the forum, and whether or not the said Martha complied with the provisions of said section.

Section 2599 provides:

“The widow of any deceased person who shall file in the office of the clerk of the court of probate, or with the probate court of the proper county, a relinquishment of her right of dower in and out of the estate of her deceased husband, shall be entitled to receive of the estate, of which her said husband died seized and possessed, whether real, personal or mixed, a portion or share thereof, absolutely in her own right, equal to that of a child, which shall be set aside and delivered to her as now provided by the law of dower.”

It is insisted by the plaintiff that the act of Congress óf May 2, 1890 (26 St. at L. 81), which extended .certain chapters of Mansfield's Digest of the' Statutes of Arkansas over " the Indian Territory, of which the Creek Nation was a part, .in reality placed in effect only the provisions ' of the said chapters which were “in force” in the state of Arkansas at the close of the Legislature in 1883, and that said section quoted supra, had been held by the Supreme Court of Arkansas not to be “in force” as part of the law of that state at the time mentioned in the said act of Congress. It is conceded, however, in making this contention, that the said section was found published as a part of chapter 53 of said Mansfield’s Digest. We think this contention is foreclosed by an interpretation given' to said extending act of May 2, 1899, by the Supreme Court of the United States, in the case of Gidney v. Chappel, 241 U. S. 99, 60 L. Ed. 911, in an opinion written by Mr. Justice Van Devanter, wherein it was by the said court stated, in discussing the said act (not this section, but one of similar status) :

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Bluebook (online)
1926 OK 347, 246 P. 603, 114 Okla. 217, 1926 Okla. LEXIS 990, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/eysenbach-v-naharkey-okla-1926.