Otwell v. Vaughan

173 So. 527, 186 La. 911, 1937 La. LEXIS 1130
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedFebruary 12, 1937
DocketNo. 33702.
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 173 So. 527 (Otwell v. Vaughan) 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
Otwell v. Vaughan, 173 So. 527, 186 La. 911, 1937 La. LEXIS 1130 (La. 1937).

Opinion

O’NIELL, Chief Justice;

This case presents a new problem. The appellees, who were the plaintiffs, and for whom the .judgment was rendered, are asking for a reversal of the judgment and for the dismissal of their suit; and. the appellants, who were the defendants in the case, are asking for a dismissal of their appeal, or, in the alternative, for an affirmance of the judgment which they appealed from. This predicament is the result of an error of law, and a misunderstanding of the facts, on the part of the attorney who filed the suit for Harry Otwell. He sued for a partition, by licitation, of a tract of land of which he was the sole and exclusive owner. He brought the suit against H. O. Vaughan and his wife, under the erroneous belief that they, or Mrs. Vaughan, owned a half interest in the land; and he made Omer J. Rowe and Fred H. Ryan and W. C. Woolf coplaintiffs in the suit, under the erroneous belief that they owned half of the mineral rights in the land, when, as a matter of fact, and as disclosed by the allegations of the pe^ tition, no one except Harry Otwell had any right or interest whatever in the *915 property which he asked to have partitioned by licitation.

The only errors made in the petition were in the conclusions with regard to the ownership of the property sought to be partitioned. The facts were stated accurately in the petition, and are supported by the deeds introduced in evidence, and in fact are not disputed. On the 21st day of July, 1923, the Rodessa Oil & Land Company sold to the defendants in this suit, H. O. Vaughan and his wife, Gertrude Trow Vaughan, the tract of land which is here involved, having an area of 16 acres, and being all of that part of the S. E. ^4 of S. E. % of Sec. 15, in T. 23 N., R. 16 W., that is on the west side of the public highway, called the model road, in the parish of Caddo. The sale was made to and in the name of both the husband and wife, thus: “Unto H. O. Vaughan, a married man, and his wife, Gertrude Trow Vaughan.” The deed was signed by both, H. O. Vaughan and Gertrude Trow Vaughan. The sale was made for $800, on terms of credit, thus: $1 was said to be paid in cash, $199 was payable in a year and 4 months, $300 in 2 years and 4 months, and $300 in 3 years and 4 months. On the 1st day of May, 1925, Vaughan, having failed to pay for the land, and being yet married to Mrs. Gertrude Trow Vaughan, retroceded the land to the Rodessa Oil & Land Company for the unpaid price; that is to say, for $1 cash and the cancellation of the three promissory notes, amounting to $799, and representing the price for which the Vaughans had bought the land. The instrument, retroceding the land to the Rodessa Oil & Land Company, was not signed by Mrs. Vaughan, but only by H. O, Vaughan. He identified himself, in the deed, as the husband of Gertrude Trow Vaughan, and identified the land as being “better known as the tract that the Rodessa Oil & Land Company sold to H. O. Vaughan and his wife, Gertrude Trow .Vaughan, on July 21, 1923.”

Our reason for mentioning that Mrs. Vaughan did not sign the retrocession of the land to the Rodessa Oil & Land Company is that article 2334 of the Civil Code, as amended by Act No. .170 of 1912 and Act No. 186 of 1920, declares that when the title to community property stands in the name of the wife, it cannot be mortgaged or sold by the husband without her written authority or consent. It was decided, however, in the case of Young v. Arkansas-Louisiana Gas Co., 184 La. 460, 166 So. 139, in March, 1936, that article 2334 of the Civil Code, as amended, did not require that a man should have the written authority or consent of his wife to sell community property that was bought in the name of both the husband and wife, because in such a case it was obvious that the property really belonged to the matrimonial community. Under the doctrine of that decision, which was rendered four months after the present case was appealed to this court, the retrocession of the 16 acres of land to the Rodessa Oil & Land Company by H. O. Vaughan, without the written authority or consent of his wife, reinvested a complete and valid title in the Rodessa Oil & Land Company.

On the 7th day of January, 1929, the Rodessa Oil & Land Company sold to Harry Otwell a tract of land having an *917 area of 60 acres, including the 16 acres which had been sold to the Vaughans and resold by Vaughan to the Rodessa Oil & Land Company. The tract which was sold to Otwell is all of the S. E. % of S. E. of Sec. 15 and the W. % of the S. W. % of S. W. V4 of Sec. 14, in T. 23 N., R. 16 W. The 20 acres forming the W. % of S. W. % of S. W. % of Sec. 14 was described erroneously, as S. W. % of S. W. % of S. W. % of Sec. 14, but the description was corrected by a deed dated March 4, 1933. On the 28th day of February, 1934, Otwell sold to Omer J. Rowe half of the mineral rights in the 44 acres of land on the east side of the public highway, or model road, and consisting of the eastern 24 acres in the S. E. % of S. E. % of Sec. 15 and the 20 acres forming the W. % of S. W. % of S. W. 1/4 of Sec. 14. The 44 acres, therefore, comprised all of the 60 acres which Otwell had bought from the Rodessa Oil & Land Company except the 16 acres which the Vaughans had owned, on the west side of the model road. On the 1st day of March, 1934, Rowe sold to Fred H. Ryan three-eighths of the mineral rights in the 44 acres of land, and retained one-eighth; and, on the 11th day of April, 1934, Ryan sold to W. C. Woolf three-sixteenths of the mineral rights in the 44 acres, and retained three-sixteenths. Therefore, when this suit was filed, Harry Otwell owned outright the 16 acres of land which the Vaughans had owned, on the west side of the model road, and Otwell owned all of the mineral rights in the 16 acres; and he owned also the 44 acres, which the Vaughans had never owned, on the east side of the model road, and Otwell owned half of the mineral rights in the 44 acres. Omer J. Rowe then owned one-eighth of the mineral rights in the 44 acres, and Fred H. Ryan owned three-sixteenths and W. C. Woolf three-sixteenths of the mineral rights in the 44 acres, in which the Vaughans had never had any interest whatever.

The attorney who brought this suit against H. O. Vaughan and his wife, for a partition, by licitation, of the 16 acres of land which the Vaughans once owned, was of the opinion that they, or Mrs. Vaughan, yet owned half of the 16 acres of land, for the reason that Vaughan did not have the written authority or consent of Mrs. Vaughan to retrocede the land to the Rodessa Oil & Land Company for the unpaid price. The reason for the error in that respect was that the case of Young v. Arkansas-Louisiana Gas Company had not been decided, and the court had never had an occasion to decide whether article 2334 of the Civil Code, as amended by Act No. 170 of 1912 and Act No. 186 of 1920, required the consent of the wife for the husband to sell community property which was bought in the name of both the husband and wife.

It appears also that the attorney who brought this partition suit believed that the 44 acres of land in which Omer J. Rowe and Fred H. Ryan and W. C. Woolf, together, owned half of the mineral rights, included the 16-acre tract which was to be partitioned, and which the Vaughans once owned, on the west side of the model road. Hence Rowe ■ and Ryan and Woolf were named as plaintiffs in this suit to partition *919

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Bluebook (online)
173 So. 527, 186 La. 911, 1937 La. LEXIS 1130, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/otwell-v-vaughan-la-1937.