Rolater v. Rolater

198 S.W. 391, 1917 Tex. App. LEXIS 927
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedOctober 27, 1917
DocketNo. 7799.
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 198 S.W. 391 (Rolater v. Rolater) 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
Rolater v. Rolater, 198 S.W. 391, 1917 Tex. App. LEXIS 927 (Tex. Ct. App. 1917).

Opinion

RASBTJRY, J.

Appellant sued appellee for divorce, partition of community property, and an accounting in that respect. Upon the verdict of the jury upon special issues of fact divorce was granted and certain sums of money allowed her and made an equitable charge against the separate real estate of appellee. Neither party complains of the divorce decree, but appellant has brought the case to this court complaining on several grounds of the accounting ordered by the judgment on the findings of the jury. These matters are so presented as to render a statement of the pleading and all the facts found by the jury unnecessary. The facts necessary to be detailed will be fully enumerated in discussing the several assignments of error.

[1, 2] The first issue attacks the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the finding of the jury that $810 of appellee’s separate funds were used in paying an indebtedness against separate lands of appellee existing at the time of the marriage of the parties. The facts necessary to be related on the issue thus raised axe these: Appellant and appel-lee were married in the year 1903, appellee owning at the time a 66-acre farm, against which there was a principal indebtedness of $1,200, which the evidence shows without dispute was paid during the years 1906, 1907, 1909, 1910, 1911, and while the marriage relation existed. The total amount of principal and interest paid on the note during marriage of the parties was $1,879. The jury found that the community funds contributed for that purpose $973, appellee’s separate funds $810, and appellant’s separate funds $96, and no complaint is made concern *392 ing the sufficiency of- the evidence to support the finding that $973 of community funds and $96 of appellant’s separate funds were applied for the purpose stated. The only proof which sustains the finding of the jury that $810 was paid out of appellee’s separate funds is his statement that he sold two mules and two cows, his separate property, from which he realized $265, which amount he says at one point he applied on his note, and at another he used in payment of household expenses. Such sum falls $545 short of the amount found by the jury to have been paid out of appellee’s separate estate. Likewise there is in the record no proof that said sum was paid from the community funds. Such being the facts disclosed by the record, counsel for appellant contends, in effect, that the presumption arises as matter of law that the sum not accounted for was paid from the community funds. No such presumption, we believe, may be indulged under the authorities. Suits for divorce and an accounting are not unlike all other judicial proceedings, in that proof must be adduced in support of every material issue asserted, and when such. issue fails of any proof at all it cannot be established by presumption. The finding of the jury that the $810 was paid out of the separate funds of the appel-lee, we agree as stated, is not supported in full by the evidence. At the same time there is nothing whatever in the record that will support a finding of fact that it was paid out of the community funds. The finding of the jury that only $973 was so paid tends to deny the presumption that the $810 was paid from the community funds. It is true that the entire indebtedness was paid by appellee during the years 1906 to 1911, both inclusive, and while the marital relation existed, but the jury found, with all the facts before them, that only $973 was contributed by the community. We have found no case exactly in point as to the facts, but it has been held that payments made shortly after marriage by one of the spouses upon separate indebtedness will not be presumed to have been made out of community funds in the absence of proof in that respect. Medlenka v. Downing, 59 Tex. 32; McDougal v. Bradford, 80 Tex. 558, 16 S. W. 619; Richmond v. Sims, 144 S. W. 1142. It is, we believe, correct to say that, in the absence of all proof on such issue, the presumption does not arise that the money so paid was not contributed by the separate estate of the spouse bound to pay. As much is said in the Medlenka Case. Hence the proof being as we have stated, and no presumption arising in support of appellant’s contention, it follows ■ that no reversible error is shown.

[3] The next contention is the claim of appellant that she was entitled to have established against the separate estate of appellee as an equitable charge the sum of $575, which the cqurt refused to do. The claim is based on these facts: Upon appellee’s farm, which we have shown was his separate property, was his residence. In the year 1915 appellant caused the residence and contents, consisting largely of appellant’s household furniture, to be insured in the name of ap-pellee against loss by fire in the sum of $2,-000, paying the premium of $81 out of her separate funds. The house and furniture were destroyed by fire, the insurance collected, out of which appellant was paid $700, the value of her household furniture, etc., $1,150 used in rebuilding appellee’s home, and the remainder used for current expenses. In the accounting appellant was allowed the amount of the premium as a charge against appel-lee. Appellant contends that, in view of the payment of the premium from her separate funds, and in the absence of anything in the contract of insurance limiting appellant’s probable interest in the insurance money in case of fire, and in view of her insurable interest therein as the consequence of her homestead rights, the proceeds of the policy became community funds, to one-half of which she was entitled. In support of her contention appellant cites the case of Martin v. McAllister, 94 Tex. 567, 63 S. W. 624, 56 L. R. A, 585. The substance of the holding in that case is that the proceeds of an insurance policy on the life of Martin’s wife payable to the former became at the death of the latter separate funds of the former, because acquired after dissolution of the marriage relation, and was not converted into community funds by the fact that the policy premiums were paid by the husband from the community, unless done in fraud of the wife’s rights. The rule so announced is, we believe, without application to the factsi of the instant ease. The insurance was payable, to Martin, and could only accrue after his wife’s death, and, as a consequence, after dissolution of the connubial partnership, and hence was not controlled by the statutes relating to acquisitions during that period. It is true that the premiums on' the policy were ’ paid from the community funds, but the court did not rule‘that community funds by such act could be converted into separate funds, as appellant, in effect, ar/gues in order to support her theory that she could by such process convert her husband’s separate lands into community holdings, but sustained the act of Martin on the ground that by law he had the sole control of the community affairs, and that his judgment in respect to what was best would not be interfered with, even when community funds were appropriated for such purpose, in the absence of a showing that such act was in fraud of the rights of the wife.

Appellant also relies upon Continental Fire Association v. Wingfield, 32 Tex. Civ. App. 194, 73 S. W. 847, and Grant v. Buchanan, 36 Tex. Civ. App. 334, 81 S. W. 820. Briefly stated, it was ruled in the case first cited, *393

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Andrle v. Andrle
751 S.W.2d 955 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1988)
Ginsberg v. Goldstein
404 So. 2d 1098 (District Court of Appeal of Florida, 1981)
Doss v. Roberts
487 S.W.2d 839 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1972)
Price v. Price
394 S.W.2d 855 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1965)
Smith v. Eagle Star Insurance Co.
370 S.W.2d 448 (Texas Supreme Court, 1963)
Eagle Star Insurance Co. v. Smith
365 S.W.2d 23 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1963)
Lee v. Honea
349 S.W.2d 110 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1961)
Maryland Casualty Co. v. Davenport
323 S.W.2d 615 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1959)
Jenkins v. Robinson
169 S.W.2d 250 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1943)
Lane v. Kittrel
166 S.W.2d 763 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1942)
First Nat. Bank in Houston v. Finn
132 S.W.2d 151 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1939)
Gillespie v. Gillespie
110 S.W.2d 89 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1937)
Eureka Security Fire & Marine Ins. Co. v. De Ross
40 S.W.2d 924 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1931)
Pacific Fire Ins. Co. v. John E. Morris Co.
1 S.W.2d 348 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1927)
United States Fire Ins. Co. of New York v. Farris
297 S.W. 575 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 1927)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
198 S.W. 391, 1917 Tex. App. LEXIS 927, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rolater-v-rolater-texapp-1917.