Union Nat. Bank v. Fox

148 S.W.2d 381, 24 Tenn. App. 664, 1940 Tenn. App. LEXIS 78
CourtCourt of Appeals of Tennessee
DecidedSeptember 21, 1940
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 148 S.W.2d 381 (Union Nat. Bank v. Fox) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Tennessee primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Union Nat. Bank v. Fox, 148 S.W.2d 381, 24 Tenn. App. 664, 1940 Tenn. App. LEXIS 78 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1940).

Opinion

CROWNOVER, J.

This suit was instituted by the Union National Bank to enforce collection of a check executed by W. C. Fox, payable to Will Tallent, dated March 13, 1936, for the sum of $475.91, to which *666 a protest fee of $2.50 was added, making a total of $478.41, the Bank claiming to be an innocent holder for value of the check.

The suit originated in a justice of the peace court where judgment was rendered in favor of the plaintiff Bank against Fox for $478.41.

On the defendant’s appeal to the Circuit Court the case was tried by the judge without a jury.

The plaintiff filed before trial a written request for a written finding of facts.

The court held that the plaintiff Bank had failed to make out its .case against the defendant and he dismissed the suit.

The plaintiff’s motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment were overruled by the court, and it appealed in error to this court and has assigned errors, which are, in substance, as follows:

(1) The trial judge erred in failing to file a written finding of facts as requested.

(2) There is no evidence to support the judgment of the court in dismissing the suit.

1. The assignment of error that complains of the trial judge’s failure to file a written finding of facts as requested is not well made for the reason that the court’s attention was not called to his failure to do so in the motion for a new trial.

It is the duty of the Circuit Judge to make a special finding of facts in writing when seasonably requested, and ordinarily the case will be reversed and remanded if he does not do so. Code, sec. 8811; Stanley v. Donoho, 84 Tenn. (16 Lea), 492; Tennessee Procedure by Higgins & Crownover, secs. 1116 to 1121; Nashville Railroad v. Price, 125 Tenn., 646, 148 S. W., 219.

There is nothing in the record, other than the special request copied in the minutes of the court and in the bill of exceptions, to show that the judge’s attention was further called to the matter during the trial.

In short, the plaintiff requested a special finding of facts in writing, and the court made a general finding in the judgment, which was not excepted to. Evidently the court overlooked the special request.

The request for a written finding of facts and the finding of facts itself are parts of the technical record and it is not necessary to preserve them in a bill of exceptions. Tennessee Procedure by Higgins & Crownover, sec. 1122; Wilson v. White, 20 Tenn. App., 604, 102 S. W. (2d), 531.

But the court’s refusal to find the facts as requested must be shown either in the minutes of the court or in a bill of exceptions. If the court’s refusal is not set out in the minutes and made a part of the technical record it must be preserved in a bill of exceptions. In the latter event it must be drawn to the court’s attention in a motion for a new trial.

According to Rule 11, subsec. 4, of this Court, this Court will not consider errors not drawn to the attention of the trial court. *667 Grace v. Curley, 3 Tenn. App., 1; Tennessee Procedure by Higgins & Crownover, p. 1053, sec. 2600.

However, we think the question whether this request was a part of the technical record is immaterial for the reason that the plaintiff waived the finding.

“Under the rule that error is not to be presumed but must be affirmatively shown, where there are no findings in the record the appellate court cannot presume that findings were not waived, the necessary intendment in favor of the judgment being that findings were waived, unless the record affirmatively shows that there was no such waiver of findings as contemplated by the statute. ’ ’ 8 Standard Ency. of Procedure, 1075, 1076; 4 C. J., 775, secs. 2723, 2724; 5 C. J. S., Appeal and Error, sec. 1564; Greer v. Greer, 31 Cal. App. (2d), 39, 87 P. (2d) 388; Nashville Railroad v. Price, 125 Tenn., 646, 650, 148 S. W., 219.

This assignment must therefore be overruled.

2. We will therefore have to consider the facts of the case as set out in the bill of exceptions, which are as follows:

W. C. Fox bought 65 hogs from Will Tallent. The hogs were delivered on Friday night, March 13, 1936, and Fox gave Tallent his check on the Farmers Bank of Cornersville for $475.91 in payment for the same.

The next morning Fox discovered that most of the hogs were sick. He notified the Farmers Bank to stop payment on the check.

At nine o’clock on the same morning, Saturday, March 14, 1936, he went to see Horace Sherrell and told him that the hogs were sick and he had stopped payment on his cheek for same, and advised Sherrell to stop payment on the check given by him (Sherrell) and Tallent to the former owner of the hogs. It appears that Sherrell and Tallent, as partners, had bought these hogs from D. W. George and Tallent had sold them to Fox. It appears that Sherrell and Tallent stopped payment on their check, which had been drawn on the Union National Bank and was signed “Tallent & Sherrell by Will Tallent” and made payable to D. W. George.

Fifty of the sixty-five hogs died. Fox requested Sherrell to remove the remaining fifteen hogs from his premises, which ■ Sherrell failed to do, and later Fox sold them.

Fox instituted suit against Tallent & Sherrell for damages and obtained a judgment in the Circuit Court for $499.99 which was appealed in error to the Court of Appeals.

Suit for the collection of this check ($478.41) was brought by Will Tallent against Fox in a justice’s court, but later dismissed.

The Union National Bank instituted this suit against W. C. Fox for the collection of this check, on September 18, 1936.

S. N. Brown, vice-president of the Union National Bank, who was teller in that bank in 1936, testified that Jack Myers was the *668 note clerk in 1936 and is now dead. Tie testified that the bank’s records showed that Will Tallent owed the bank a note for $600 dated March 7, 1936; that this check (signed by Pox and made payable to Tallent, for $475.91, dated March 13, 1936) was applied on the note and the balance, paid in cash, on March 17, 1936; that the check was not honored by the Farmers Bank but was returned to the Union National Bank, on March 21, 1936, and carried by it as a cash item; that the check was filed in the Circuit Court of Giles County in another suit and the Bank required Tallent to give it a note for $478.41 in order to keep, its records straight and to satisfy the bank examiner. He further testified that the Union National Bank was the owner and holder of this unpaid check, but admitted that he was testifying from the bank’s records and not from his own knowledge.

W. D. Pox, a brother of the defendant W. C. Pox, and a bank officer (but not of the banks herein involved), testified that on March 24, 1936, Will Tallent brought this check to Lewisburg and instituted suit against W. C.

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Bluebook (online)
148 S.W.2d 381, 24 Tenn. App. 664, 1940 Tenn. App. LEXIS 78, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/union-nat-bank-v-fox-tennctapp-1940.