Leary v. Shaffer

79 Ind. 567
CourtIndiana Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 15, 1881
DocketNo. 9060
StatusPublished
Cited by27 cases

This text of 79 Ind. 567 (Leary v. Shaffer) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Leary v. Shaffer, 79 Ind. 567 (Ind. 1881).

Opinion

Elliott, C. J.

— On the 11th day of October, 1877, the appellant joined with her husband in the execution of amortgage upon real estate to the Indiana National Bank to secure a debt owing to the bank by him. This mortgage passed by assignment to the appellee Shaffer, who instituted an action of foreclosure in 1878, and in October of that year secured a decree. Sale was made on the decree and the appellees New and Shaffer became the purchasers. Prior to the commencement of the foreclosure suit, the husband was adjudged a bankrupt and all of his property conveyed to an assignee. Theassignee was not made a party to the foreclosure suit, but theappellees, after their purchase at the sheriff’s sale, filed a petition in the United States District Court against the assignee- and the appellant’s husband, praying an order directing the execution of a conveyance to them. An order was entered granting the prayer of the petition and directing that the petitioners Shaffer and New should appear to any petition which might be filed by the appellant in the Hancock Circuit Court and consent that the proceedings in foreclosure should be-opened and reviewed. The facts detailed were set forth in a. petition or complaint filed by the appellant, and by an amendment subsequently made she alleged that she is the owner of’ the one undivided third part of the land; that the land is of the-value of $9,750; that two-thirds of the land is amply sufficient to pay the mortgage debt and will sell for a sum sufficient to pay it, and that she executed the mortgage as the surety of her husband.

[569]*569The court below sustained a demurrer to the complaint, and' úpon this ruling error is assigned.

The Hancock Circuit Courthad jurisdiction of the subject-matter of the foreclosure suit, but as the assignee in bankruptcy had succeeded to the equity of redemption of the bankrupt mortgagor the judgment was void as to him, because he was not a party to the action. This was so adjudged, upon the appellee’s petition, by the district court, and is the declaration of a familiar rule of law. It has been many times decided by this court,, that the owner of the equity of redemption must be made a party defendant to the action to foreclose, or no valid decree can be rendered. The district court had jurisdiction of the bankrupt and his estate, and had authority to make the order which the petition of the appellees induced it to enter, and in-, doing this did not disregard any valid judgment of a State court. This judgment of the United States Court can not be-collaterally questioned. It follows, therefore, that the order-made by the district court sending the case to the circuit court-is valid and effective, and that, as the circuit court possessed general jurisdiction of the subject-matter of the foreclosure suit, it had authority to consider and determine the-right of the appellant to relief from the original judgment of’ foreclosure.

It is urged that Mrs. Leary was not a party to the proceeding in the Federal court, and can not take the benefit of its; judgment. The appellees are not in a situation to push aside-her rights in defiance of an order made upon their own petition. Their decree was invalid because the owner of the equity of redemption was not a party to the foreclosure suit. They asked the court having jurisdiction in bankruptcy matters to validate it. This request the court granted, but upon designated terms, and upon these terms the appellees must accept the relief awarded them or not at all. They can not avail themselves of the benefit of the order, and disregard the conditions upon which it was granted.

This is not an ordinary bill of review. The district court [570]*570directed the appellees to consent to a judicial investigation of the 'rights of the appellant. This direction was made upon the appellees’ petition invoking the aid of that court, and it was made a condition of the relief granted them, that they .•should consent to an investigation. This was the conclusive judgment of the court to which appellees had appealed, and, :as that judgment can not be impeached, it fetters them. If the ■district court had jurisdiction, as unquestionably it had, to •order the assignee to either convey or abandon the mortgaged property, it had power to settle all incidental matters. Appellees, having secured that judgment, must abide by it, not merely as to so much of it as pleased them, but to the whole judgment, the bitter as well as the sweet.

The inchoate right of the appellant in the lands of • her husband was transformed into a vested one by the conveyance to the assignee in bankruptcy. Ketchum v. Schicketanz, 73 Ind. 137; McCracken v. Kuhn, 73 Ind. 149; Roberts v. Shroyer, 68 Ind. 64; Lawson v. DeBolt, 78 Ind. 563. The mortgage which she had joined in executing became a lien on this vested interest. Graves v. Braden, 62 Ind. 93; Hoadley v. Hadley, 48 Ind. 452. Where the wife’s interest is merely inchoate when the mortgage is executed, but afterwards be•comes vested, the lien is fastened upon the greater estate. ‘This must necessarily be so, for the inferior estate disappears when the greater comes into existence.

When the right to enforce the mortgage matured, the wife’s interest was a distinct and vested one. She had a right to partition against others than the mortgagee, for it is shown by the cases first cited, that, upon the conveyance to the assignee in bankruptcy, the rights of the wife became so fixed as to entitle her to have one-third of the land set off to her in severalty. The interest she then acquired would make the land her ■own separate property, not, of course, divested of the lien of the mortgage, but as against all other persons than the mortgagee.

It is settled that a wife who executes a mortgage upon her '.separate property for her husband’s debt is to be regarded as [571]*571a surety. An author, justly praised for his accuracy, says: “A wife who has mortgaged her separate property for her husband’s debt is in the position of a surety, and her liability and the mortgage lien is discharged by the extension of time of payment without her consent, if the extension be a binding obligation upon the mortgagee.” 1 Jones Mortgages, sec. 114. The same principle is laid down by Brandt, in his work on Surety-ship. But this principle does not fully meet the question here presented, for the property was not the wife’s when the mortgage was executed, and in such cases a different rule obtains, and the wife is not a surety. Brandt Suretyship, section 22. As the appellant was not a surety when the mortgage was executed, her rights can not grow into those of a surety as against her mortgagees. We can not, therefore, regard her as a surety in the strict sense of the term, although she surely does occupy a position closely analogous to that of a surety.

The wife undoubtedly has some equity even while her right is purely an inchoate one. This is so or a long line of decisions must be overthrown, for it has been held again and again that she may redeem from the mortgage. The rule goes further; she must be made a party to the action of foreclosure even where the mortgage is for purchase-money or her right to redeem is not barred. May v. Fletcher, 40 Ind. 575.

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Bluebook (online)
79 Ind. 567, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/leary-v-shaffer-ind-1881.