Williams v. Hayes

140 So. 293, 19 La. App. 326, 1932 La. App. LEXIS 306
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedMarch 16, 1932
DocketNo. 4257
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 140 So. 293 (Williams v. Hayes) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Williams v. Hayes, 140 So. 293, 19 La. App. 326, 1932 La. App. LEXIS 306 (La. Ct. App. 1932).

Opinion

PALMER, J.

Plaintiff brings this suit on a promissory note of the defendant for $936.87, with 8 per cent, per annum interest after maturity, and 10 per cent, as attorney’s fees incurred in collecting the note, which indebtedness is secured by a chattel mortgage on two International motortrucks and trailers, and which is subject to a credit of $477.51, paid on November 12, 1930. The credit on the note resulted from a repurchase by plaintiff from defendant of one of the trucks and trailers described in the chattel mortgage. The consideration paid for the repurchase of this truck and trailer was $600, and a portion of it was applied in the payment of an open account of defendant, and the balance credited on this note. In connection with the suit, plaintiff seeks to foreclose his chattel mortgage and sequestered the other truck and trailer described therein.

The defendant filed no appearance in the suit, but allowed judgment to -be rendered against him on default.

Two days after plaintiff filed this suit, J. Lee Hayes, son of the defendant, filed an intervention and third opposition, alleging, in effect, that he is the owner of the truck and trailer under seizure, that he purchased same from plaintiff and paid him therefor, and that the mortgage which plaintiff seeks to foreclose was canceled by confusion because plaintiff repurchased these trucks and trailers from defendant and afterwards sold him the truck and trailer now under seizure.

Answering the petition of intervener, plaintiff reaffirmed his allegations contained in his main demand, to the effect that the property in question was sold by him to the defendant, with vendor’s lien retained and chattel mortgage stipulated, and that he never reacquired the property from defendant, or any other person, and that no payments have been made to him upon the note sued on, except the payment alleged in his petition. In the alternative, he alleges that, if intervener has title to this truck and trailer, which is denied, he acquired same from the defendant, subject to plaintiff’s chattel mortgage which contains the pact de non alienando and was duly recorded in the mortgage records of Sabine parish, La.

The lower court rendered judgment on the main demand in favor of plaintiff, and [294]*294against the defendant, for the amount sued for, but on the intervention rendered judgment in favor of intervener, decreeing him the owner of the seized truck and trailer, and canceling the chattel mortgage which plaintiff holds thereon.' From this judgment plaintiff prosecutes this appeal.

There are no disputed questions of law involved. Certainly none .could dispute that for a transaction to constitute a sale “three circumstances concur to the perfection of the contract, to-wit: The thing sold, the price and the consent.” Civ. Code, art. 2439.

Neither can there be any dispute about the well-settled principle that: “As there must be two parties at least to every contract, so there must be something proposed by one and. accepted and agreed to by another to form the matter of such contract; the will of both parties must unite on the same point.” Civ. Code, art. 1798.

Also there can be no disagreement over the principle that: “When the qualities of debtor and creditor are united in the same person, there arises' a confusion of right, which extinguishes the obligation.” Civ. Code, art. 2217.

It is not questioned that: “He who claims the execution of an -obligation must prove it. On the other hand, he who contends that he is exonerated, must prove the payment or the fact which has produced the extinction of the obligation.” Civ. Code, art. 2232.

A judgment in the case. necessarily rests upon a decision of the facts. Certainly, if intervener has proved his allegations to the effect that plaintiff repurchased the seized property from defendant and then sold the same to him, the judgment awarding intervener the seized property and canceling, by confusion, plaintiff’s chattel mortgage, is correct, but intervener carries the 'burden of proving such allegations.

Before considering the question of whether or not intervener met the obligation of the burden of proof, it might be well to-make a statement of the circumstances surrounding the case.

O. E. Williams, the plaintiff, appears to be engaged in operating in Sabine parish a sales agency for the International Harvester Company of America, Incorporated, for the sale of International Harvester Trucks, and in connection therewith he owns and operates a repair and service garage. In the pursuit of his business, he sells these trucks and trailers and takes notes from the purchasers for the greater portion of the consideration, and then secures the notes by retaining and stipulating vendor’s lien and chattel mortgage on the trucks sold. These notes are then transferred by him to the International Harvester Company, who handles the collection of them in their own way and through their own collectors. Plaintiff appears to have no connection whatever with the matter after the sale has thus been completed and the notes transferred to the company.

The defendant, M. T. Hayes, purchased from plaintiff several trucks and trailers on this basis. Always the collection of the notes of the International Harvester Company is handled by them through 'their own collector, who at the time of this transaction was Mr. W. B. Hirsch.

On April 8, 1930, plaintiff sold to defendant the truck and trailer seized in this suit. At that time defendant owed plaintiff an open account which, added to the cash payment due to be made on this purchase, amounted to $936.S7. As evidence of this indebtedness, defendant executed unto plaintiff the note sued on in this case, and secured it by a chattel mortgage on the property sold and also on another truck and trailer, which he had previously purchased from plaintiff. On all these trucks and trailers purchased by the defendant from plaintiff, the International Harvester Company appears to have a first chattel mortgage, and, as we have already stated, their collections were handled by their own collector, and with which plaintiff appears to have no connection.

With this statement of the circumstances made, we shall now consider the evidence adduced on trial of the intervention. The burden rests upon the intervener to prove affirmatively the following essential facts:

(1) That plaintiff repurchased this property from defendant, and that (a) the price was fixed and definite; and (¾) that the will of both plaintiff and defendant united in the transaction whereby both consented thereto.

(2) That intervener purchased the seized property from plaintiff, and that (a) the price was fixed and definite; and (b) that the will of both plaintiff and intervener united in the transaction whereby both consented thereto.

M. T. Hayes, the defendant in the main demand, testified as a witness for intervener. We believe the following question propounded to the witness by counsel for intervener, and his answer thereto, shows the full strength of his evidence on the alleged resale by him to plaintiff of the property now under seizure: “Q. What, if anything, did you do by way of trading those trucks back? A. I drove them both back here to his store and, Mr. Hirsch had come down to Eisher to see me.

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140 So. 293, 19 La. App. 326, 1932 La. App. LEXIS 306, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/williams-v-hayes-lactapp-1932.