Insurance Inv. Corp. v. Hargrove

179 S.W.2d 383, 1944 Tex. App. LEXIS 651
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMarch 1, 1944
DocketNo. 11286.
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 179 S.W.2d 383 (Insurance Inv. Corp. v. Hargrove) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Insurance Inv. Corp. v. Hargrove, 179 S.W.2d 383, 1944 Tex. App. LEXIS 651 (Tex. Ct. App. 1944).

Opinion

MURRAY, Justice.

On April 21, 1943, this Court delivered an opinion holding that the judgment here.in was not such a final judgment as would support an appeal, 17T S.W.2d 384. The Supreme Court granted a writ of error and on January 5, 1944, reversed this judgment, holding the judgment to be a final judgment such as would support an appeal and remanded the cause to this Court for further consideration, 176 S.W.2d 744. In keeping with that opinion we now proceed to a consideration of the cause upon its merits.

We here copy the statement of the case as set out in the opinion of the Supreme Court, 176 S.W.2d 744, to-wit: “While there were several preliminary agreements between the parties, the suit, as tried, is on a contract in the form of a note, with a *384 number of 'additional provisions, whereby respondent, Insurance Investment Corporation, promised to pay petitioner, Mrs. Har-grove, the total sum of $31,771.20. The note was given in payment for 6,688 shares ■of stock of Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company. It is payable in monthly installments, the first of $1,000 on March 16, 1942, and subsequent installments of $500 each on the 16th day of each month thereafter ‘until the several sums thus payable and like sums to be held and retained by the maker hereof on account of the pendency of the law suit brought by Santa Fe National Life Insurance Company against Teachers Annuity Life Insurance 'Company in a district court of Bexar County, Texas, shall total the full amount of the principal sum of this note, to wit, $31,771.-20.’ ”

The note provides that on the 16th day of each month the maker will credit on its books to Mrs. Hargrove a like amount to the amount payable under the terms of the note and that all amounts so credited shall be retained until final disposition of the ■suit brought by Santa Fe National Life Insurance Company and shall be applied, but not in excess of $17,500, to the payment of one half of the amount of the judgment that may be recovered by the said Santa Fe Insurance Company against Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company, the remainder of the retained funds to be paid to Mrs. Hargrove. The note further provides for maturity of all unpaid installments, at the holder’s option, if any installment becomes, •delinquent and so remains for thirty days, and it is secured by the pledge of a certificate for 3,344 shares of the capital stock of Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company.

The petition filed by Mrs. Hargrove and her husband, on which the case was tried, alleges the sale by Mrs. Hargrove of the 6,688 shares of stock of Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company to Insurance Investment Corporation, the execution of the several preliminary contracts and the execution and provisions of the note for $31,-771.20, above described, including the pledge of the certificate for,.3,344 shares of stock as security for the note. It alleges default in payments due according to the terms of the note and that the suit by Santa Fe Life Insurance Company against Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company is still pending and prays judgment for the whole amount owing to plaintiff and for general relief. The supplemental petition, which the trial court at plaintiff’s request treated as a trial amendment, alleges further defaults in payments due according to the terms of the note and plaintiff’s election to mature the full amount agreed to be paid and prays for judgment for the whole amount evidenced by the note.

The trial answer of respondent, which was defendant in the district court, denies the plaintiff’s allegations and prays for judgment canceling and holding for naught the contracts and instruments described in the petition. As grounds for their cancellation it alleges particularly that Mrs. Hargrove did not own 6,688 shares of the stock of Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company but owned only 5,688 shares; that the contracts never became effective and the consideration therefor wholly failed because plaintiff verbally agreed that they were not to be effective until she obtained and delivered to defendant 1,000 shares of the stock of Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company then held by the treasurer of the State of Texas and those shares were never obtained; that the contracts should be cancelled because plaintiff and her husband represented that Teachers Annuity Life Insurance Company was solvent and owned property worth at least $270,000, whereas in truth the corporation was insolvent and the value of the property was far less than that represented by plaintiff; and that the contracts should be canceled because they were never actually delivered to plaintiff but were left with her attorney with the agreement that they would be held by him until plaintiff procured the release of the 1,000 shares of stock held by the state treasurer.

At the conclusion of the evidence the trial court instructed a verdict in favor of plaintiffs and proceeded to render judgment in their favor in the aggregate principal sum of $31,771.20. There are many other provisions of the judgment which we need not here set out.

From this judgment Insurance Investment Corporation has appealed.

Appellant’s first point reads as follows: “The Court should not have instructed a verdict in favor of the plaintiff.”

Appellee objects to our considering this point for the following reasons, to-wit:

“(a) Said ‘first point’ ⅛ fatally defective in that it is too vague, indefinite and uncertain to constitute ‘an assignment of error’;
*385 “(b) Same is fatally defective because it does not state any fact or reason why there was alleged error on the part of the trial judge in instructing a verdict herein for Mrs. Hargrove;
"(c) It is legally insufficient because it is not followed or supported by any proposition applicable to the peculiar facts of the instant case;
"(d) It is not followed or supported by any statement of record facts which show that the trial court erred in instructing a verdict herein for Mrs. Hargrove;
“(e) The .pleadings of appellant in the trial court were legally insufficient to raise or present any such alleged issue or issues of fact as that or those vaguely suggested by appellant in its ‘statement’ and its ‘argument ’ presented under said ‘first point.’ ”

We overrule this contention, for, as was said by Justice Critz in Fambrough v. Wagley, 140 Tex. 577, 169 S.W.2d 478, 482, “Our present briefing rules were adopted for the purpose of simplifying the briefing of cases so that greater attention will be devoted to the presentation of the merits of the appeal, and less attention given to the mechanics of the brief. The object of a ‘point’ in the brief, as provided for in Rule 418, is to call the Court’s attention to the questions raised and discussed in the brief. It is intended that the ‘point’ shall be short or in few words. It is not necessary that a ‘point’ be complete within itself, in the sense that it must, on its face, show that the matter complained of presents reversible error.

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179 S.W.2d 383, 1944 Tex. App. LEXIS 651, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/insurance-inv-corp-v-hargrove-texapp-1944.