Lewis v. Clay

60 So. 2d 78, 221 La. 663, 1952 La. LEXIS 1248
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedJune 2, 1952
Docket40528
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 60 So. 2d 78 (Lewis v. Clay) 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
Lewis v. Clay, 60 So. 2d 78, 221 La. 663, 1952 La. LEXIS 1248 (La. 1952).

Opinion

HAWTHORNE, Justice.

This is a petitory action by plaintiff-appellee Dónese Johnson Lewis against Ruth Rambo Clay and Roy Taylor Clay, in which she seeks to be recognized as the true and lawful owner of the following described property :

Lot 18, Block “B” Ingersoll Heights Subdivision, City of Shreveport, Caddo Parish, Louisiana, together with all buildings and improvements thereon, being municipal No. 1436 Ford Street, Shreveport, Louisiana.

The facts are not in dispute and are substantially as follows:

*668 On January 29, 1945, plaintiff conveyed to her son, Roy Taylor Clay, the above described property by authentic act of sale in which defendant Roy Taylor Clay was declared to be the husband of Ruth Rambo Clay. This act recited a consideration of $2,000 cash in hand paid and was executed by both the vendor and the vendee named therein. After the execution of this instrument Roy Taylor Clay and his wife, the defendant Ruth Rambo Clay, went into possession of the property, and defendant Ruth Rambo Clay was in possession on the date the instant suit was filed. On July 6, 1949, after Clay and his wife went into possession, a judgment of separation from bed and board was rendered in favor of Ruth Rambo Clay and against Roy Taylor Clay, which was duly recorded in the conveyance records of Caddo Parish. This judgment terminated the community of acquets and gains, existing between them, and in that proceeding the property involved herein was inventoried as community property.

Approximately three months after the judgment of separation, Roy Taylor Clay and Dónese Johnson Lewis executed a document styled “Revocation of Donation” before a notary public and two witnesses. In this instrument, whereby Roy Taylor Clay conveyed to his mother Dónese Johnson Lewis the hereinabove described property, the parties declared that the cash sale theretofore made was in truth and in fact an act of donation, that the consideration recited therein was not paid, and that both parties to this act desired to and did revoke, annul, and set aside the prior act and placed the title of the property back in Dónese Johnson Lewis.

After refusal of defendant Ruth Rambo Clay to vacate the premises at the request of plaintiff, the present suit was instituted. Plaintiff’s petition, when considered with the attached documents, sets forth substantially the above facts. Defendant Ruth Clay filed an exception of no cause or right of action, which was overruled by the trial judge. Reserving all of her rights under this exception, she then answered setting forth that she was in possession of the property as owner of an undivided one-half interest therein by virtue of her community right.

Defendant Roy Taylor Clay, son of plaintiff, filed no answer, and a default judgment was entered against him.

After trial on the merits the lower court rendered judgment recognizing the plaintiff as the true and lawful owner of the property, and from this judgment defendant Ruth Rambo Clay has appealed to this court. Appellee has answered the appeal praying that the judgment of the lower court be affirmed, and in the alternative that, in the event this court should reverse the' judgment, the case be remanded to the lower court for the admission of certain evidence which was offered by her in support of her alternative pleas but which the lower court would not permit her to introduce.

Plaintiff, in her petition, seeks to have-the court declare the authentic cash sale *670 made by her and her son a donation and her to be the true and lawful owner of the property by virtue of the instrument which is styled “Revocation of Donation”. In the alternative she prays that the cash sale be rescinded and set aside for lack of consideration, and, further in the alternative, that it be reformed to show the true intention of the parties thereto. In support of her alternative demands she alleges that the conveyance of the property to her son was made in the form of a cash deed on advice of counsel and that it was made in this form through error.

At the trial on the merits in support of the allegations in her petition plaintiff offered in evidence her original deed of acquisition, the cash deed to her son, the document styled “Revocation of Donation”, and a certified copy of the judgment of separation from bed and board rendered in favor of defendant Ruth Rambo Clay and against Roy Taylor Clay.

The document styled “Revocation of Donation” was admitted in evidence over the objection of counsel for the defendant Ruth Rambo Clay. On objection of counsel for the defendant the lower court refused to permit the plaintiff to prove by parol testimony that the authentic act of sale to her son, although in the form of a cash deed, was intended to be a donation, the court holding that such testimony would be proper only in rebuttal in the event the defendant Ruth Clay sought to show that this conveyance was in fact a sale.

We are of the opinion that the district judge erred in permitting, as against the defendant'Ruth Rambo Clay, the introduction in evidence of the act of revocation.

The cash deed from plaintiff to her son was made at the time he was married to and living with the defendant and during the existence of the community of acquets and gains, and the presumption arose at that time that the property belonged to the community. ' Art. 2402, LSA-Civ. Code; Houghton v. Hall, 177 La. 237, 148 So. 37, and authorities therein cited.

This presumption in favor of the community of acquéts and gains which existed between Roy Taylor Clay and his wife, is juris et de jure as to the husband Roy Taylor Clay, and it is well settled that acquisitions of real property in the name of the husband during the marriage creates a presumption in favor of the community juris et de jure unless there is contained in the deed the double declaration that the property is acquired with the separate funds of the husband and for his separate estate. Slaton v. King, 214 La. 89, 36 So.2d 648, and authorities therein cited.

The judgment of separation from bed and board dissolved this community, art. 155, LSA-Civ.Code; Conrad v. Conrad, 170 La. 312, 127 So. 735, and under Article 2405 of the LSA-Civil Code all property which both husband and wife reciprocally possess at the time of the dissolution of the marriage is presumed to be community property. Although a separation from bed *672 and board does not constitute the final dissolution of a marriage, it does operate as a dissolution of the community, and the provisions of Article 2405 are applicable. See Rocques v. Freeman, 125 La. 60, 51 So. 68.

Under the well settled jurisprudence of this state, after dissolution of the community the husband no longer has the right to convey, dispose of, or sell the wife’s interest in the property. German v. Gay, 9 La. 580; Bennett v. Fuller, 29 La.Ann. 663; Myers v. Brigham, 34 La.Ann. 1026; Tillery v. Fuller, 190 La. 586, 182 So. 683.

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Bluebook (online)
60 So. 2d 78, 221 La. 663, 1952 La. LEXIS 1248, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lewis-v-clay-la-1952.