Adams v. Lee
| Decision Date | 13 April 1875 |
| Citation | 31 Mich. 440 |
| Court | Michigan Supreme Court |
| Parties | Franklin B. Adams v. Wilson Lee |
Heard April 8, 1875
Error to Van Buren Circuit.
Judgment reversed, with costs, and a new trial ordered.
George W. Lawton, for plaintiff in error.
Lester A. Tabor, for defendant in error.
The fundamental error of the court in this case was in treating the machinery in question as having been fixtures annexed to the freehold. A brief recital of the facts in the case will show that such could not have been their legal character.
The real estate in question was owned by John H. Kaufman May 29, 1867. Before that time, under some arrangement not shown, and not now important, a building had been erected upon this real estate, and machinery for the manufacture of wool had been put into the same, which was owned by Augustus E. Hardy. The machinery appears to have been annexed to the building in a substantial manner. On the day named, Kaufman conveyed an undivided one-fourth of the real estate to Hardy, and the latter sold to Kaufman an undivided one-half of the machinery. This made Kaufman owner of three-fourths the land and one-half the machinery, and Hardy the owner of one-fourth the land and one-half the machinery. January 29, 1868, Kaufman sold an undivided fourth of the real estate, together with his half of the machinery, to Warren G. Kinney. This made Hardy and Kinney owners of the undivided one-half of the real estate and of the whole of the machinery. August 25, 1868, Hardy sold to Kinney, giving him a deed of an undivided one-fourth of the real estate, and delivering possession, which of course would be sufficient to transfer the title to any personalty which might have been included in the sale. On this sale, Kinney gave to Hardy a mortgage on the undivided one-half of the real estate to secure the payment of the purchase price, or a part thereof. The machinery was not mentioned in this mortgage, but Lee, who has become purchaser of the mortgaged premises on a foreclosure of this mortgage, claims that the mortgage covered the machinery as fixtures, and so it was held by the circuit court. Adams, on the other hand, asserts a right to the machinery by a purchase of it as personal property, made by him from Kinney previous to the foreclosure.
An examination of these facts will show that at no time has there been unity of ownership of the land and the machinery put into the building. Kaufman at the outset owned the one without having an interest in the other, and no one...
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