Thomas v. Dudrey

494 P.2d 1039, 208 Kan. 684, 1972 Kan. LEXIS 493
CourtSupreme Court of Kansas
DecidedMarch 4, 1972
Docket46,132
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 494 P.2d 1039 (Thomas v. Dudrey) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Thomas v. Dudrey, 494 P.2d 1039, 208 Kan. 684, 1972 Kan. LEXIS 493 (kan 1972).

Opinions

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Fromme, J.:

This action was brought to recover damages for the violation of the rights of a tenant-operator of land under a conservation reserve contract. The trial court entered judgment in [685]*685favor of the tenant-operator against the purchaser of the land and her husband. The husband had been substituted as tenant-operator in a revised contract in place of the plaintiff.

Some background facts are necessary.

In 1949 Ruth Oden, a non-resident, owned the NW % of Section 2, Township 24, Range 14, in Stafford County, Kansas. She leased the land for two years to the plaintiff, Elbum G. Thomas, under the ordinary crop share lease for one-third of all crops raised on the premises. Thereafter the plaintiff continued in possession of this land through 1959 as an ordinary farm tenant without any written renewal lease.

In 1960 the parties placed the land in the “soil bank” by making application and by executing a ten year conservation reserve contract with the secretary of agriculture. The plaintiff cultivated and seeded the land to grass and performed such maintenance and weed control as was required by the contract. The annual soil bank payment of $2,119.00 was to be shared equally during the term of the contract.

Ruth Oden died and a revised or modified contract was executed on November 16, 1960, by her administrator, the plaintiff and the secretary of agriculture. This contract covered the same period as the previous contract, ending in 1969, and contained the same terms and conditions as before.

After the estate of Ruth Oden was settled, her son, Ivan A. Oden, became the new owner and he entered into another revised contract on October 31, 1962. The contract was signed by Ivan A. Oden, the plaintiff and a member of the county committee for the secretary of agriculture. It covered the same period, ending in 1969, and contained the same terms and conditions as before.

In 1966 the land was sold. The agreement to sell was between Ivan A. Oden and W. H. Dudrey. The deed, executed and delivered under the contract, named the wife of W. H. Dudrey as grantee. The land was transferred subject to the rights of the agricultural tenant and the deed mentioned that the premises were under contract in the conservation reserve program.

Thereafter W. H. Dudrey and Elsie Dudrey, bis wife, succeeded in obtaining a revised soil bank contract for the balance of the original ten year term which eliminated the plaintiff as tenant-operator. For the balance of the term W. H. Dudrey as tenant-operator and Elsie Dudrey as owner received the'entire amount of the soil bank payments. The change was made July 31, 1966.

[686]*686This change in the tenant-operator was protested by plaintiff to the county committee on August 15, 1966. His protest was based upon a claimed right to continue as tenant-operator for the entire ten year period ending in 1969, under the prior soil bank agreements with Ruth Oden and Ivan A. Oden. He asserted the change of tenant was not bona fide, that the title of the real estate was placed in the wife’s name by W. H. Dudrey so that W. H. Dudrey might take over the plaintiff’s rights as tenant-operator. Plaintiff further asserted that the land was purchased and sold subject to his rights under the conservation reserve contract and that the Dudreys violated his rights by obtaining the revised soil bank contract for the balance of the ten year term.

Plaintiff first pursued his administrative remedies. Review of the action of the county committee was sought on both the state and the federal levels. These attempts to require the county committee to recognize him as the rightful tenant-operator in place of W. H. Dudrey were unsuccessful. The state office ruled that any question as to the private rights of plaintiff and W. H. Dudrey “is determinable under applicable state law and the circumstances of the particular case.” In Washington, D. C. the acting deputy administrator of state and county affairs refused to enter the controversy. In a letter, otherwise ambiguous, he stated the matter “is a question between him [Thomas] and the landlord [Dudrey] to be resolved by the Kansas courts.”

Plaintiff then brought the present action to recover damages from the Dudreys in the amount of the tenant-operator’s share of the annual soil bank payments received by them from 1966 to the end of the contract period in 1969.

The action was tried before the district court without a jury. Judgment was entered in favor of plaintiff and against the defendants, Elsie Dudrey and W. H. Dudrey. The Dudreys have appealed.

Although appellants set forth in the record 14 separate alleged errors in their statement of points their argument in the brief is not separated or directed toward these 14 alleged errors. Those points neither briefed nor argued on appeal will be deemed abandoned. (State, ex rel., v. Doerschlag, 197 Kan. 302, 304, 416 P. 2d 257.)

The questions to be answered in this appeal are set out by the appellants in their brief as follows:

[687]*687“The questions presented in this case are: Did Thomas have any rights in and to any soil bank payments under the Soil Bank Contract in question after the sale of this property by Mr. Oden to Elsie Dudrey, the termination of such contract by the Stafford County A. S. C. Committee, and the approval by the County Comittee of W. H. Dudrey as operator of this land? If Thomas had any such rights, then the further question arises: Do such rights give rise to a cause of action in his favor against the Dudreys, or either of them, or must he pursue his remedy against the U. S. Department of Agriculture?”

The trial court made comprehensive findings of fact and conclusions of law. Pertinent portions of these findings and conclusions are as follows:

“. . . Both W. H. and Elsie Dudrey knew that plaintiff was the tenant in possession under this program. Before the deed was executed, both W. H. and Elsie Dudrey conferred about plaintiff’s status. They believed that plaintiff could be removed as tenant without incurring any liability to him. They believed the record title owner could not be the tenant under this program.
“The purchase of this land was a joint venture of W. H. and Elsie Dudrey. The written contract to purchase was in favor of W. H. alone. . . .
“. . . In any event, the conviction that they could substitute W. H. Dudrey for the plaintiff as soil bank tenant was a consideration that entered into the final determination of the Dudreys to take the land in the name of Mrs. Dudrey. This finding is legally permissible since the trier of fact is permitted to use that knowledge common to men in general. In this connection, all of the circumstances indicate that the Dudreys were guided by a desire to secure the tenant’s soil bank payments for themselves, a trait common to man, the desire for financial gain. . . .
“Throughout, the sale proceedings, Mr. Oden advised the County Committee and the Dudreys that plaintiff had tenancy rights under this program in an attempt to protect plaintiff’s interest for the full ten-year period. This included putting a provision in both the contract and deed which stated that the sale was subject to the rights of tenancy under the Soil Bank Program.

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Thomas v. Dudrey
494 P.2d 1039 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1972)

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Bluebook (online)
494 P.2d 1039, 208 Kan. 684, 1972 Kan. LEXIS 493, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/thomas-v-dudrey-kan-1972.