Sisters of Charity of Incarnate Word v. Emery

81 So. 99, 144 La. 614, 1919 La. LEXIS 1598
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedFebruary 3, 1919
DocketNo. 21622
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 81 So. 99 (Sisters of Charity of Incarnate Word v. Emery) 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
Sisters of Charity of Incarnate Word v. Emery, 81 So. 99, 144 La. 614, 1919 La. LEXIS 1598 (La. 1919).

Opinion

O’NIEDL, J.

The object of this suit was, ostensibly, to compel the defendant to comply with an agreement to buy, for $30,000, the property known as the old Schumpert Sanitarium site, at the corner of Texas avenue and Grand avenue, in Shreveport. In reality, as far as the original defendant is concerned, it is an amicable suit to test title to the property.

The defendant answered that plaintiff’s title was defective and particularly that a certain act of donation inter vivos made by Dr. John I. Schumpert, now deceased, to the plaintiff’s author in title was invalid, for several reasons which were specifically urged in defensé of the suit. On defendant’s demand, the heirs at law, collateral relations, of the deceased Dr. John I. Schumpert were cited as proper parties to defend the suit. They appeared, and, pleading nullity of the act of donation, for the reasons urged by the defendant Emery and for other reasons advanced by them, asked to be declared the owners of the property by inheritance from the deceased Dr. John I. Schumpert. The plaintiff then filed a plea of estoppel, claiming that Dr. John I. Schumpert had, by his conduct in certain particulars, recognized and ratified plaintiff’s ownership of the property, and that his heirs had also, by having all of the property of his estate inventoried and appraised and sold, and by dividing the proceeds among them, without claiming the property now in contest, recognized plaintiff’s title. The only serious contest then arose between the plaintiff and the Schumpert heirs. Judgment was rendered in favor of the plaintiff, declaring the title resulting from the dqnation valid. The defendants, Emery and the Schumpert heirs, prosecute this appeal.

[1, 2] The main cause of attack upon the validity of the donation, dated May 19, 1908, is that there was then no corporation having the corporate name “the Sisters of. Charity of the Incarnate Word, of Galveston, Texas,” the name by which the donee was designated or described in the act of donation. The defendants objected to the introduction of testimonial proof that the donee referred to in the act of donation was a corporation chartered under the Jaws of Texas, having the corporate name the “Hospital of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, St. Mary’s Sanitarium, Galveston, Texas,” generally called the “Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word.” As the evidence introduced, over defendants’ objection, leaves no possible doubt or dispute of the identity of the donee, that element in the defense to the suit depends altogther upon the question of admissibility of parol evidence to identify the donee.

The property was bequeathed by the son of Dr. John I. Schumpert, Dr. T. Edgar Schumpert, in his last will and testament, dated May 13, 1908, to the religious order designated in the will thus, “To the Sisters now occupying and operating the Shreveport Sanitarium,” and the legacy was described in the will as “the property known as the Shreveport Sanitarium.” The sanitarium property was then and had been for several years leased by Dr. T. E. Schumpert to the religious order called in the lease the “Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word,” being the corporation styled in its charter the “Hospital of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, St. Mary’s Infirmary, Galveston, Texas.”

Dr. T. E. Schumpert, in his practice of medicine, had been closely identified with the Shreveport Sanitarium, conducted by the Sisters of Charity. He was a patient there during his last illness, and died in the institution on the 16th of May, 1908. Because of some informality, his will was considered invalid, and was not offered for pro< bate. His father, being the sole heir, accepted the succession unconditionally, and was sent into possession under an order of court.

Desiring to carry out the will of his de[619]*619parted, son, Dr. John I. Schumpert made the donation in confirmation of the will, on the 19th of May, 1908, only 3 days after the son’s death. Although the donee was called in the act “the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, of Galveston, Texas,” the donor left no doubt about the identity of the donee; for he declared in the act that the donation was made in pursuance of the last will of Dr. T. E. Schumpert and because of his love and admiration for the said sisters and the noble and beneficent work they had done.

The act of donation itself, therefore, identified the donee as the religious order to whom the deceased, Dr. T. E. Schumpert, had willed the sanitarium property; and the will, in turn, identified the legatee as the Sisters who were then occupying and conducting the Shreveport Sanitarium, the property bequeathed. The only testimony that was needed, if indeed any was needed, and all that was offered to identify the donee, was to prove that the religious order who had leased the premises in the name of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word was the same that was incorporated in Texas, in 1894, under the name the “Hospital of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, St. Mary’s Sanitarium, Galveston, Texas.” The testimonial proof was that there was no other institution, organization or association, either in Shreveport or in Galveston, known as the “Sisters of Charity” or the “Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word,” but that the corporation domiciled in Galveston, conducting a hospital there as well as in Shreveport, was generally known and referred to in Shreveport as the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, or, even more generally, the Sisters of Charity.

The objection to the testimony was and is that parol evidence is not admissible to prove title to real estate, or to contradict, vary, or enlarge the terms of a written instrument. The answer to the objection is that the parol evidence did not have that effect. The act of donation conveyed the title to the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word; and the proof was merely that the full and correct corporate name of that institution was the hospital of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, St. Mary’s Infirmary, Galveston, Texas. In so far as the testimony changed or enlarged the terms of the written instrument, it was admissible under the exception, made in articles 1714 and 1715 of the Civil Code, to the general rule excluding parol evidence to change or enlarge a written instrument. The codal provisions referred to are that, in case of obscurity or doubt about the identity of a legatee named or described in a will, testimony is admissible to show who was intended to be the legatee, as, for example, when there are two or more persons bearing the name of the legatee, the identity may be established by evidence as to who of the two or more persons of the same name was most intimate with the testator. And, in case of such doubt, or of any doubt about the intention of the testator, says article 1715 of the Code, recourse may be had to any and all circumstances that may aid in discovering his intention. There is no reason why that rule should not apply as well to a donation inter vivos as to a donation mortis causa, when the donor is dead.

It is argued in the brief of counsel for the Schumpert heirs that the plaintiff did not allege that there was ambiguity, doubt, or uncertainty as to the identity of the donee named in the act of donation. In truth there was not much room for doubt or uncertainty in that respect. But the Schumpert heirs made the issue by pleading that there was no corporation in existence, when the donation was made, having the name of the donee, “Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, of Galveston, Texas.” To meet that issue, testimony was admissible to show that there was

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Bluebook (online)
81 So. 99, 144 La. 614, 1919 La. LEXIS 1598, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sisters-of-charity-of-incarnate-word-v-emery-la-1919.