United Land & Irrigation Co. v. Fleming

239 S.W. 610, 1922 Tex. App. LEXIS 574
CourtTexas Commission of Appeals
DecidedApril 5, 1922
DocketNo. 299-3603
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 239 S.W. 610 (United Land & Irrigation Co. v. Fleming) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Texas Commission of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United Land & Irrigation Co. v. Fleming, 239 S.W. 610, 1922 Tex. App. LEXIS 574 (Tex. Super. Ct. 1922).

Opinions

RANDOLPH, J.

On the 28th day of January, 1915, the United Land & Irrigation Company entered into a contract with Lorena S. Fleming and E. H. Fleming, whereby it contracted for the exchange of certain lands owned by the company situated in Cameron county, hereinafter designated the lands in controversy, for lands, stock, farming tools, etc., belonging to the Flemings, situated in .Lampasas county. The lands in Lampasas county were valued by agreement at $60,000, and the consideration recited in the contract was the exchange of the lands, the sum of $5,000 cash paid by the company to the Flem-ings, and four vendor’s lien notes executed by the Flemings, aggregating the sum of $30,000, payable to the order of the company on or before five years from date of deed, bearing 8 per cent, interest per annum from date, payable to the order of the company, to secure which a vendor’s lien was to be retained in the deed from the company to the Flemings, conveying the land in controversy, and also secured by deed of trust. These notes were executed to cover the excess between the value of the company lands and the lands and personal property to be transferred to it by the Flemings. It was also stipulated in «this contract that all of the lands in controversy were watered by the canals of the Indiana Go-operative Canal Company and subject to its constitution, bylaws, rules, and regulations, each acre carrying with it one share of stock in the Canal Company, except the block known as block 401, which was to be conveyed without such water rights,, but which was to have an easement for a. canal extending across block 400 to the Rio Grande river, and said block 401 was to be taken as containing SO acres, and at that acreage was to be paid for at the same price as the irrigated land, $150 per acre. The contract contained other provisions not necessary to state here.

It appears that the Flemings either performed or tendered performance of their part of the contract, and that after many months of delay, caused by the failure of the company to furnish good title to its lands to the satisfaction of the attorney for the Flem-ings, the company filed suit in the district court of Cameron county on May 10, 1916, cause No. 3051, seeking a foreclosure on the four vendor’s lien notes above mentioned, alleging that these notes were in the hands of W. B. Abney, of Lampasas, but that it was the owner of and entitled to the possession of them.

Defendants Fleming by their first amended original answer and cross-action filed at the November term, 1917, of said district court, pleaded a general denial, failure of consideration of said contract, prayed for rescission of the contract and in the alternative for damages for breach thereof, and expressly pleaded their performance or attempted performance of same, and further:

“That plaintiffs, their agents, servants, and employés represented that said lands were under a sufficient canal system, one of the best in the Rio Grande Valley; that it was a cooperatively owned organization; * * * that said canal system was of sufficient capacity to furnish abundant water to all lands under the said system; and that the drainage for said canal system was excellent. * * * Defendants show in this connection that said representations were false; that said canal system was insufficient and was not capable of watering all the lands under its system and was in a bad state of repair.”

Pending a trial of the case, the Flemings having gone from Houston to Brownsville to be present at the trial of said cause 3051, the parties came together to attempt a compromise or settlement. In the negotiations attending such effort to compromise, it is claimed by the Flemings:

“That the representations were made by Singer, the president of the company, and Hunt, the agent, which they later urge as their cause of action in this particular suit.”

Afterwards, on the return of the Flemings to Houston, Hunt went to Houston and continued the negotiations for a settlement.These negotiations terminated in a new contract and the closing of the deal. The possession of the Flemings property and the deeds from the Flemings conveying same having already been delivered to the company, the company delivered its deeds ■ conveying the lands to the Flemings and receiving from [612]*612the Flemings the vendor’s lien notes for $30,-000 as above described and deed of trust, and the Flemings dismissed their cross-action.

Thereafter the Flemings, on the 6th of April, 1920, filed their suit against the United Land & Irrigation Company and E. S. Hunt, praying for cancellation of the notes and deed of trust and for damages. E. S. Hunt, who had been made a party to the suit, as alleged owner of the notes under appropriate allegations to charge him as such owner with notice of the material matters involved in the cause of action, and the United Land & Irrigation Company filed their answer and cross-action seeking a recovery upon the notes and a foreclosure of the vendor’s lien and deed of trust liens. ,

The case was submitted to the jury upon special issues, and on the answers by the jury to the issues, which were entirely favorable to the Flemings, the trial court rendered judgment as prayed for by them. On appeal to the Court of Civil Appeals for the Fourth District, that court affirmed the judgment. 225 S, W. 843.

The application for writ of error in various ways raises the question that where the parties to a contract of sale entered into a “solemn writing” expressing the terms, and where parties to the sale of land bind themselves by a solemn contract in writing in January, 1915, with regard to all the terms of a sale of land, representations made in December, 1917, to induce one of the parties to comply with the terms of the former contract, with certain modifications favorable to him, cannot be held to have induced the purchase of the land. In other words, it is contended substantially, that a valid and binding contract having been entered, into by the parties in January, 1915, representations made in December, 1917, in securing a compromise settlement between the parties, cannot be considered as releasing either party from the prior contract.

The answer to this proposition depends wholly on the facts of the case. The trial court submitted the case to the jury upon the theory that the transactions between the parties which culminated in the new, contract was a separable transaction and stood by itself. The Flemings, after entering into the original contract, brought suit to cancel it, and set up matters of fraudulent representations as to the capacity of the canal system to water the lands. In addition to the allegations of insufficiency of the canal set out in their petition in cause-No. 3051, the evidence tends to show such knowledge of facts by the Flemings as would put them upon inquiry, to say the least, and, having been put upon inquiry, would have led to the discovery of the facts which they charged, and would estop them from urging the insufficiency of the canal at a subsequent date if those facts had been found to be true and “there had been no further representations not connected or tied to the prior representation. Wortman v. Young (Tex. Com. App.) 235 S. W. 559.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
239 S.W. 610, 1922 Tex. App. LEXIS 574, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-land-irrigation-co-v-fleming-texcommnapp-1922.