Pearson v. Richards

211 P. 167, 106 Or. 78, 1922 Ore. LEXIS 117
CourtOregon Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 19, 1922
StatusPublished
Cited by24 cases

This text of 211 P. 167 (Pearson v. Richards) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Oregon Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pearson v. Richards, 211 P. 167, 106 Or. 78, 1922 Ore. LEXIS 117 (Or. 1922).

Opinion

HARRIS, J.

The appellants contend that, even though it be decided that the plaintiff is entitled to equitable relief, the decree must necessarily be reversed because the complaint fails to allege facts showing that the reassessment constituted a valid lien; and in our opinion this contention of the appellants must be sustained. The complaint merely .alleges:

“That at all times herein mentioned there was and now is a lien against lot 6 * * for the improvement of 12th Street # # in favor of defendant City of Salem, and in the sum of $209.42, * * upon which there has been nothing paid, and that at all times herein mentioned there was a lien against lot 5 * * in the sum of $191.95 * * in favor of defendant City of Salem, and upon which no payments have been made”; and “that said lien is in fact a valid and [85]*85subsisting • lien against said property, as above described.”

The very foundation of plaintiff’s cause of suit is the claim that the reassessment is a valid lien. The plaintiff is asking a court of equity to relieve his property from the burden of the reassessment. If there is no lien there is no need for relief. There can be no lien unless the reassessment was a valid one. The plaintiff is the moving party and consequently he must allege and prove facts showing the existence of a lien. It must be remembered that the plaintiff is endeavoring to establish the fact that the appellants are liable for the payment of the reassessment. The plaintiff is seeking to charge a proportional amount of the reassessment against the appellants. The bald assertion that the reassessment “is in fact a valid and subsisting lien against said property,” is not sufficient in the face of a demnrrer. If the appellants had answered without demurring to the complaint and had subsequently permitted the introduction of evidence without objection we might be justified in sustaining the complaint after decree on the authority of Winters v. Privett, 86 Or. 501 (168 Pac. 942); but in the instant case the appellants not only demurred but. stood upon their demurrer and refused to answer; and in this situation the decision rendered in Equitable Savings & Loan Assn. v. Hewitt, 55 Or. 329 (106 Pac. 447), is conclusive, and by force of that precedent the plaintiff is required to allege facts from which the court can draw the conclusion that the reassessment is a valid lien. See, also, Dillon v. Beacon, 67 Or. 118, 121 (134 Pac. 778, 135 Pac. 336), where it is assumed in the course of the discussion that it is necessary to plead facts constituting a valid assessment and lien in an action [86]*86for damages resulting from the breach of a covenant in a deed. A mere conclusion of law is not issuable, requires no denial, and does not aid a pleading: Almada v. Vandecar, 94 Or. 515, 519 (185 Pac. 907).

The deed given by Margaret I. Richards and C. B. Richards contains a covenant of warranty, a general covenant against encumbrances, and a special covenant concerning the reassessment. A covenant of warranty and a covenant against encumbrances are regarded as independent covenants: 7 R. C. L. 1141, 1152. Plaintiff’s cause of suit, if hé has one, involves a consideration of the general covenant against encumbrances and the special covenant concerning the reassessment; and the appellants claim that these two covenants, whether taken singly or together, are personal and not real covenants, and that therefore the plaintiff cannot maintain a suit or action for the breach of either or both of such covenants for the reason that a right of action did not pass to the plaintiff.

If the covenant relating- to the reassessment constitutes a personal covenant, the plaintiff cannot maintain this suit; but if in the attending circumstances it is to be treated as a real covenant, then such covenant runs with the land until a breach occurs and a remote grantee can sue for a breach occurring while he is the owner of the land: 15 C. J. 1253, 1256, 1259; 7 R. C. L. 1111, 1122, 1123.

When construing covenants in a deed courts ought if possible to ascertain and give effect to the intention of the parties, and if it appears from the whole tenor of the deed, the nature of the thing to be done, its relation to the property, the period of its continuance, and the like, that the parties intended that a covenant should run with the land, then in order to carry out such intention the covenant should [87]*87ordinarily be construed as a real covenant and therefore as one running with the land: Brown v. Southern Pac. Co., 36 Or. 128 (58 Pac. 1104, 78 Am. St. Rep. 761, 47 L. R. A. 409); 7 R. C. L. 1085, 1101, 1102; 15 C. J. 1241.

It is said that

“a covenant to run with the land must, from its nature, have a continuance, and is made in contemplation of, and to guard against, some event which may fall out or happen in the future, or to provide for some act to be performed thereafter that respects the land.” 7 R. C. L. 1100.

All covenants that are not prospective and do not pass with the land are personal: 11 Cyc. 1106; 7 R. C. L. 1111. See Dickinson v. Hoomes, 8 Gratt. (Va.) 353, 395. In Post v. Campau, 42 Mich. 90, 97 (3 N. W. 272), Judge Cooley used the following language :

“A covenant may be said to run with the land when its purpose is to give future protection to the title which the deed containing the covenant undertook to convey, and it does not run with the land when its whole force is spent in giving assurance against something which immediately affects the title and causes present damage.”

See also 15 C. J. 1247. Unless the covenant is clearly one against future disturbance it is regarded as one in praesenti: 15 C. J. 1271; 11 Cyc. 1111.

Some authorities take the view that a general covenant against encumbrances is a real covenant and therefore runs with the land, while in a majority of the jurisdictions, including Oregon, the courts hold that it is a personal covenant and therefore does not run with the land: 7 R. C. L. 1105, 1112, 1135, 1163; Sanford v. Wheelan, 12 Or. 301, 307 (7 Pac. 324).

[88]*88Usually controversies arising out of breaches of covenants against -encumbrances involve situations where the covenant was breached at the moment the deed was delivered for the reason that at that very moment an encumbrance existed, and delivery of the deed plus the existence of the encumbrance at once effected a breach of the covenant; and consequently in those situations the distinction between real and personal covenants is not of great importance so far as a remote grantee is concerned for the reason that even a real covenant upon breach ordinarily ceases to run with the land: 15 C. J. 1253.

Damages arising from a broken covenant do not run with the land: Wesco v. Kern, 36 Or. 433, 435 (59 Pac. 548, 60 Pac. 563). It may be assumed that if the instant case involved no covenant exqept a general covenant against encumbrances the plaintiff would not be entitled to sue the appellants on such covenant; because the reassessment if a valid lien, would, in that situation, have been an encumbrance at the time of the delivery of the deed to Eunice Fleenor and instantly upon the delivery of the deed such a covenant would have been broken.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
211 P. 167, 106 Or. 78, 1922 Ore. LEXIS 117, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pearson-v-richards-or-1922.