Perkins v. Terrell
Perkins v. Terrell
Opinion of the Court
Appellee, C. J. Terrell, brought this suit for himself and for the use and benefit of W. O. Gillespie, to rescind a contract for the sale of certain' real and personal property, to cancel deeds executed in pursuance to the preliminary eontrac-t of sale, and to recover the land and personal property delivered to the defendant thereunder. Judgment was rendered for the plaintiff on a trial before a jury.
The one assignment presented by appellant on this appeal asserts that the court erred in overruling the appellant’s general demurrer to the plaintiff’s petition, on the grounds: First, that it appears therefrom that W. O. Gillespie is a necessary party to the suit; and, second, that the petition does not al-c lege that demand for rescission was made by the plaintiff before the institution of the suit. It will therefore be necessary to state only so much of the pleading as is necessary to a consideration of these two questions.
It is alleged in the petition that the plaintiff, C. J. Terrell, owned section 59, block 10 T, in Castro county; that his son-in-law, W. O. Gillespie, owned the S: W. ¾ of section 54, block 10 T; and that the plaintiff and the said Gillespie also owned and were in possession of certain personal property— cattle,, horses, mules, farming implements, etc. The personal property is particularly described, but it does not appear whether the ownership thereof by the. said plaintiff and Gillespie was joint or several. It is further alleged that the said Gillespie had authorized the plaintiff to trade and sell all of said property, and that the plaintiff entered into a contract in his own name for the sale and conveyance of said property to the defendant, in consideration of $16,000 in notes, executed by a third party and secured by vendor’s lien on certain land in Webb county, Tex.; that plaintiff was induced to make said contract by fraudulent representations made by the defendant and her agents to him, concerning facts that determined the value of said notes; that said notes were as a matter of fact practically worthless, while plaintiff was induced to believe they were good; that in fulfillment of the executory contract induced by such fraud, and before discovery thereof, the plaintiff and the said W. O. Gillespie conveyed to the defendant by deed the said two tracts of land owned by them respectively; that the plaintiff transferred to the defendant title and possession of all of said real and personal property. The plaintiff tendered to the defendant the notes and other consideration received in such trade, and prayed for judgment for the title and possession of said real and personal property, for the cancellation of said deeds, etc. The petition, after stating the ownership of said one-quarter section of land to be in Gillespie, contains this clause:
“For whose use and benefit he is suing herein for such property as may have belonged to *552 said Gillespie and -which was included in the deal and trade hereinafter mentioned.”
No other statement of any authority from the said Gillespie to bring the suit is made, nor is there any statement as to why the said Gillespie did not Join in the suit in his own name. The only allegation as to demand for rescission is contained in this paragraph of the petition:
“(7) That the defendant, though often requested, has failed and refused, and still fails and refuses, to deliver possession and title to the aforesaid property which he has been swindled out of.”
Obviously, the concern of the defendant in any such case would be the assurance that the judgment rendered in the case would bind the party for whose use and benefit the suit was brought, and in those classes of cases we have mentioned the nominal plaintiff has such title or stands in such relation to the cause of action as that the judgment rendered therein would be res ad-judicata of it. There are some authorities that hold that a plaintiff who has no interest in or title to the cause of action itself cannot maintain an action for the use and benefit of some one else. C. J. vol. 1, 983. There are also some authorities which'hold that an agent, though having no title to the cause of action himself, may by express authority from the principal conduct a suit for the principal in. the agent’s name. Mecham on Agency, § 2023, citing Eggleston v. Colfax, 4 Mart. (La. N. S.) 481; Frazier v. Willcox, 4 Rob. (La.) 517; Varney v. Hawes, 68 Me. 442; Close v. Hodges, 44 Minn. 204, 46 N. W. 335. The prosecution of a suit of this kind, however, in which, so far as stated in the petition, it appears that the ownership of a part of the property to be affected by the suit was in the usee Gillespie alone, with no legal title or interest therein in the plaintiff, is unusual — as much so perhaps as the suits in trespass to try title being considered in the cases of Hooper v. Hall, 30 Tex. 154; Birmingham v. Griffin, 42 Tex. 148, and Smith v. Olsen, 44 S. W. 874. In this kind of case the judgment would bind the said Gillespie only in the event the suit had been conducted in such way under authority from him. The conclusion of the court as to the authority itself would not bind him unless he, in some way, participated in the proceedings or acted in connection therewith so as to be estopped. So that, ordinarily, we should say that, if the question of the plaintiff’s authority to conduct the suit for the use of Gillespie were seasonably raised, the defendant would have had the right to have required that the said Gillespie be made a party in fact, so that there could be no question that the adjudication would be final as to his interests.
We are of the opinion that the judgment should he affirmed.
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