Parten v. Wilson

243 S.W.2d 198, 1951 Tex. App. LEXIS 1693
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedSeptember 20, 1951
DocketNo. 4762
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 243 S.W.2d 198 (Parten v. Wilson) 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
Parten v. Wilson, 243 S.W.2d 198, 1951 Tex. App. LEXIS 1693 (Tex. Ct. App. 1951).

Opinion

R. L. MURRAY, Justice.

This case was originally brought in the County Court of Jasper County by Jeanette Parten, joined by her husband, C. M. Parten, against Evelyn Wilson and her husband, Ed Wilson, under the provisions of Article 3590, Revised Civil Statutes of Texas, 1925, for the purpose of establishing the plaintiff Jeanette Parten as an heir at law of Nooner Collins, deceased. It was plaintiffs’ theory and allegation that Jeanette Parten and Evelyn Wilson were sisters and were the children of George and Ettie Delaney, husband and wife, and that in their early childhood they were taken by Nooner Collins and his wife, Kate Collins, into their home for the purpose of adopting them and under an oral agreement and contract to adopt them, and that under the doctrine of estoppel in pais the said Jeanette Parten became an heir at law of said Nooner Collins, deceased. The defendants filed their answer, consisting of a general denial and special denial that plaintiff had any legal capacity to sue, as she was not a legal heir of the said Nooner Collins, deceased, and alleging that no facts existed that would create estoppel to deny her adoption. After an unfavorable judgment in the County Court, plaintiffs appealed to the District Court of Jasper County. There the case was tried to a jury, and resulted in a judgment upon the jury’s verdict in favor of appellees, Evelyn Wilson and her husband, against the appellants, Jeanette Parten and her husband. After their motions for instructed verdict and for judgment non obstante veredicto and for a new trial were overruled, the appellants duly perfected their appeal to this court.

The trial court submitted four Special Issues to the jury. Special Issue No. 1 was as follows: “Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that Nooner Collins about the year 1912 agreed with Mrs. Ettie Delaney to take Jeanette Delaney into his home and adopt her as his own child?” To this issue the jury answered “No”.

Special Issue Noi. 2 inquired whether Mr. and Mrs. Nooner Collins about the year 1912 took Jeanette Delaney into their home and treated, reared and cared for her as their own child. Special Issue No. 3 inquired whether Jeanette- Delaney rendered to Mr. and Mrs. Nooner Collins the love, obedience, affection and duties of a child just as if she had been born to them. Special Issue No. 4 inquired whether Ettie Brown about the year 1912 permanently gave up and surrendered to Mr. and Mrs. Nooner Collins her parental control and custody of Jeanette Delaney. The jury answered all of these Special Issues “No”.

The appellants bring their appeal under nine points. The first, second, third, eighth and ninth points all present the argument that there was no issue of fact made by the evidence to submit to the jury and that the uncontroverted evidence of both plaintiffs and defendants was conclusive that Jeanette Parten was placed with Nooner Collins and his wife by her mother, Ettie Delaney, for permanent custody and adoption under an agreement that Jeanette Delaney would be adopted by them, that such evidence conclusively established facts that constitute as a matter of law adoption by estoppel of Jeanette by Mr. and Mrs. Collins, and that said contract and agreement was carried out by the parties, that such evidence established conclusively the relationship of parent and child between Jeanette and the Collins, and that the verdict of the jury is without support in the evidence.

The parties to this appeal are not in dispute as to the law in Texas relating to the doctrine of adoption by estoppel. The appellants cite and quote from prac[200]*200tically all of the Texas authorities relative thereto, beginning with the case of Cublcy v. Barbee, 123 Tex. 411, 73 S.W.2d 72 and ending with Cavanaugh v. Davis, Tex.Sup., 235 S.W.2d 972, 977. The appellees say that all the cases cited are authorities in support of their position on this appeal, that is, that an agreement or contract to adopt is the ultimate issue in the case and must be established by the evidence before an adoption existed or the doctrine of estoppel in pais is applicable. We believe this is correct. In the case of Cavanaugh v. Davis, supra, the opinion by Justice Calvert points out that in no case has the Supreme Court of Texas upheld the adoptive status of a child in the absence of proof of an agreement or contract to adopt. The opinion further stated a proposition which we think applicable to the determination of this appeal, in view of the jury’s finding here that no agreement to adopt was made. “The question here is not whether the trial judge could have found the existence of the agreement • as alleged from the evidence here summarized but whether he was compelled to do so; not whether the relevant facts and circumstances as established by the acts and conduct of the parties would authorize a logical inference that the agreement did exist but whether such facts and circumstances would permit of no other reasonable inference.”

A summary of the evidence must therefore be made. -It is shown without dispute that George Delaney and Ettie Dis-mulce were married in 1908 and had two children, Jeanette born in 1909 and Evelyn born in 1911. Prior to 1912 George Delaney deserted his wife and two children, leaving them without any means of support. In 1912, while Ettie Delaney and her two children were living in Beaumont, Nooner Collins of Jasper, Texas saw Mrs. Delaney in Beaumont and made some agreement with her about taking the two children to his home to raise. In accordance with the agreement, he took the two children to his home in Jasper when Jeanette was about three years of age and Evelyn about one and a half years of age. He and Mrs. Collins reared them in their home, sending them to school and church and treating them in all respects as if they were their own children. They were known by the name of Collins. In the year 1923 Mr. Collins formally and legally adopted Evelyn. Ettie Delaney is now Ettie Brown, wife of R. G. Brown. She made no effort to see her children until about 1922 when she saw them at the school house at Jasper. In 1923 Jeanette left the Collins home and went to Houston, where she lived with her real mother, Mrs. Brown, until her own marriage. In 1923 Mrs. Brown brought suit against Mr. and Mrs. Collins in the District Court of Jasper County for the custody of Evelyn. Judgment in that suit was rendered in favor of the Collins, leaving custody of Evelyn with them. Mrs. Kate Collins died testate in 1942, leaving her property by will to her husband Nooner Collins. Nooner Collins died intestate in 1948. The testimony given by Mrs. Brown was as follows:

“When Mr. Delaney and I separated, Jeanette was about 2½ years old and Evelyn about 1 year old, one born in 1909 and one in 1911. Mr. Delaney never gave me a penny from the time he left me for the children’s support. I kept the children with me after we separated as long as I could. They stayed with me until the last part of 1912. I worked in a laundry and paid a lady to keep them in the day time and I kept them at night. I kept them until 1912. I met Mr. Nooner Collins and Mrs. Kate Collins in Brooklyn, Texas, before I was married to Mr. Delaney. I was in their home many times. I never saw Mr. Collins for many years until in Beaumont, I was in a cafe one day, and he came where I was eating. He recognized me. He came over to the table and asked me ‘Aren’t you the Dismukes’ gixd?, and I said ‘Yes, sir, I am.’ He asked about George Delaney who had worked for him in the stave mill. He also asked me where the children were.

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Bluebook (online)
243 S.W.2d 198, 1951 Tex. App. LEXIS 1693, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/parten-v-wilson-texapp-1951.