Wood v. Sharp's Administrator

166 S.W. 787, 159 Ky. 46, 1914 Ky. LEXIS 746
CourtCourt of Appeals of Kentucky
DecidedMay 15, 1914
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 166 S.W. 787 (Wood v. Sharp's Administrator) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wood v. Sharp's Administrator, 166 S.W. 787, 159 Ky. 46, 1914 Ky. LEXIS 746 (Ky. Ct. App. 1914).

Opinion

Opinion of the Court by

Judge Settle

— Affirming.

[47]*47This is an appeal from a judgment of the circuit court refusing to allow a claim of $925.00, asserted by the appellant, D. S. Wood, against the estate of John M. Sharp, deceased. Sharp died August 9, 1909, testate, leaving a considerable estate, but the administrator with the will annexed, finding it insufficient to pay his debts, brought suit to settle the estate, and the case was referred to a commissioner to report the assets and liabilities. Sharp conducted a brokerage business in Louisville for several years before his death. The appellant, by answer and counterclaim, set up and prayed judgment for a demand of $5,886.21, alleged to be due him from the decedent’s estate upon account, and this claim, duly verified, was filed with the commissioner. It appears from the books of Sharp, and is admitted by appellant, that of this indebtedness $3,029.97 arose from operations on the stock market through Sharp as broker, and $2,856.24 from operations on the grain market.

The allowance of all but $925.00 of appellant’s claim was resisted before the commissioner by George Pfau, also a creditor of the estate, who objected to it on the ground that the whole of it, except the $925.00 mentioned, which the books of Sharp showed to have been deposited with him by appellant in cash July 14, 1909, as margins on grain speculations, represented profits arising from wagering transactions which, it was claimed, Sharp’s estate was not liable for. The commissioner, on the evidence taken by him, sustained the contention of Pfau, and rejected all of the claim of appellant except the item of $925.00, which was allowed. Following the filing in the circuit court of the report of the commissioner showing this action on appellant’s claim, the latter excepted to it. On the hearing of these exceptions and those filed to other claims reported on by the commissioner, the circuit court overruled appellant’s exceptions in part and sustained them in part, but in so doing allowed $3,029.97 of his claim and disallowed $2,856.24 thereof. The part allowed was what was due appellant by way of profits growing out of his operations with Sharp on the stock market, and the $2,856.24 disallowed profits realized by him through Sharp as broker on the grain market; the rejected part of the claim included the $925.00 which had been allowed appellant by the report of the commissioner, all of which is shown by the judgment of the court entered January 7, 1913, which also allowed or rejected the claims, respectively, of other creditors of [48]*48Sharp’s estate reported on by the commissioner. No exception was entered by appellant to this judgment or appeal taken therefrom. Several weeks after this judgment was rendered appellant filed with the commissioner an independent claim for the $925.00 cash deposit made by him with Sharp July 14,1909, and asked its allowance, the claim being supported by the affidavits of appellant and others. We have been unable to find in the record any order of the court referring the case to the commissioner a second time for a report as to additional claims against the decedent’s estate. But waiving that matter, we do, however, find from the record that counsel for the .administrator appeared before the commissioner and objected to any further consideration by him of the claim in question, and also to its allowance, upon the ground that it had previously been presented in another form by appellant and disallowed by the judgment of the court previously entered, January 7, 1913, which, it was claimed, made the matter res judicata. This view of the question was adopted by the commissioner, and by his report, later filed, the claim was disallowed. Appellant excepted to the report but the court, as shown by its judgment then entered, overruled the exception and confirmed the report, thereby sustaining the commissioner’s rejection of the claim. This appeal is prosecuted from that judgment.

It is insisted for appellee that, as the only question presented by this appeal was decided by the judgment of the circuit court on January 7, 1913, from which no appeal was prosecuted, the present appeal from the subsequent order or judgment of that court refusing a relitigation of appellant’s claim for the $925.00 and again rejecting it cannot be entertained by this court. In other words, that the first judgment being final and conclusive of appellant’s rights, the matter of appellant’s claim is res judicata. If this contention prevails other questions raised by appellant’s counsel need not be considered.

In our opinion the contention is sound. The first judgment manifestly disallowed appellant’s claim, and being final and conclusive, it barred his right to relitigate the claim as attempted by the second application to the circuit court for its allowance. His remedy was to move to set aside the judgment, or an appeal therefrom to this court. Neither of these remedies was resorted to. Instead a second application for the allowance of the re[49]*49jected claim was made and the appeal is from the judg-. ment disallowing it the second time. It is the policy of the law to conclude all litigation as speedily as may be consistent with the ends of justice. It is, therefore, a well recognized rule that a former judgment, until vacated or reversed, is conclusive in a subsequent action between the same parties as to all demands, claims or titles put in issue and adjudicated in the first suit, although the second has a different object or relates to a different subject matter. The following amplification of this doctrine is thus stated in 23 Cyc., 1170:

“A judgment on the merits, rendered in a former suit between the same parties or their privies, on the same cause of action, by a court of competent jurisdiction, is conclusive not only as to every matter which was offered and received to sustain or defeat the claim, but as to every other matter which might with propriety have been litigated and determined in that action. A party therefore must present in one action all the reasons, grounds, and evidence which he may have in support pf his claim pr defense, and if he has several claims or titles to the property in controversy he must assert them all. Again if a party is brought into a case and has a fair legal opportunity to present and enforce any claim he may have in relation to the subject matter he must avail himself of it, and whether an original party or an intervener, he must present his whole case, extending his claim so as to embrace everything which properly constitutes a part of his cause of action or defense. Further a plaintiff must recover in one action all he is entitled to; if dissatisfied with the result, he cannot bring a new suit to recover something more on the same cause of action.” Elswick v. Matney, 132 Ky., 294; Sumrall v. Maninni, 124 Ky., 67; Holtheide v. Smith’s Guardian, 27 R., 60; McDaniel v. Stumm’s Admr., 23 R., 1935; Moriarity v. Vessey, 6 Bush, 115.

In Commonwealth v. Churchill, 131 Ky., 252, which was an attempt by a revenue' agent in a second proceeding to have listed for taxation property which the county court had failed to assess on a previous similar application by him, we held that the judgment rendered by the county court on the first application was res judicata and that the second proceeding could not be maintained. In the opinion it is said:

“While the county court acts ministerially in assessing property, it acts judicially in determining whether [50]

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Richmond Health Facilities-Kenwood, LP v. Nichols
811 F.3d 192 (Sixth Circuit, 2016)
Deering v. Stites
78 S.W.2d 46 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976), 1934)
Agnew v. L. W. Henneberger Company
63 S.W.2d 592 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976), 1933)
National Life Accident Ins. Company v. Hedges
27 S.W.2d 422 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976), 1930)
Turner v. Deaton
294 S.W. 1063 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976), 1927)
Cumberland Pipe Line Company v. Spears
271 S.W. 581 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky (pre-1976), 1925)
Hopkins v. Jones
235 S.W. 754 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky, 1921)
Cassidy v. Berkovitz
185 S.W. 129 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky, 1916)
Stone v. Winn
176 S.W. 933 (Court of Appeals of Kentucky, 1915)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
166 S.W. 787, 159 Ky. 46, 1914 Ky. LEXIS 746, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wood-v-sharps-administrator-kyctapp-1914.