Aura L. Meredith v. Minnie E. Meredith
| Decision Date | 07 April 1921 |
| Citation | 229 S.W. 179,287 Mo. 250 |
| Parties | AURA L. MEREDITH et al., Appellants, v. MINNIE E. MEREDITH |
| Court | Missouri Supreme Court |
Appeal from Knox Circuit Court. -- Hon. James A. Cooley, Judge.
Affirmed.
J. C Dorian and Higbee & Mills for appellants.
(1) The court erred in refusing the offer to prove by Anderson that he held the deed and notes as agent for the grantor. (2) The court erred in refusing plaintiff's declaration of law. The deed was incorporated in the memorandum, and was testamentary. Shulsky v. Shulsky, 98 Kan. 69; Goodale v. Evans, 263 Mo. 219; Bryan's Appeal 68 L. R. A. 354, note. (3) The court erred in refusing plaintiff's declaration of law No. 2. This is an action at law. Hayes v. McLaughlin, 217 S.W. 262; Van Valkenburg v. Allen, 126 N.W. 1092; Williams v Latham, 113 Mo. 165; Gomel v. McDaniels, 269 Ill. 362; Linn v. Linn, 261 Ill. 606; Hayden v. Collins, 81 P. 1120; Anderson v. Messenger, 158 F. 250, 85 C. C. A. 468. (4) The burden was on defendant to prove that the grantor delivered the deed irrevocably and beyond his control. This she did not do. The circumstance in evidence show that Meredith retained control of the deed. The court erred in not rendering judgment for the appellants. See cases cited under Point 3. (5) The deed was delivered by the grantor to Anderson, his agent, in trust and for safe keeping for him, and not to a third party. It was under his control, and not in escrow for the respondent. The court erred in not finding for the appellants. Zimmerman v. Zimmerman, 161 N. W. (Wis.) 369; Schooler v. Schooler, 258 Mo. 83; Sneathen v. Sneathen, 104 Mo. 201; Whitely v. Babcock, 202 S.W. 1091; Cole v. Cole, 108 N. W. (Mich.) 101; Grilley v. Grilley, 18 Conn. 380, 4 L. R. A. (N. S.) 816; Terry v. Glover, 235 Mo. 544.
Arthur V. Lashly and Stewart & Stewart for respondent.
(1) The delivery of the deed to Anderson, cashier of the Home Bank, by Meredith was a valid delivery for the benefit of the wife, and the delivery by it to her and her acceptance thereof, after the death of the grantor, relates back to the time when the deed was first delivered to the bank and makes it a transfer as of that date. Sneathen v. Sneathen, 104 Mo. 209; Williams v. Latham, 113 Mo. 165; Burkey v. Burkey, 175 S.W. 624. (2) The grantor made no reservation of control over the deed when he delivered it to the bank for Minnie E. Meredith and therefore the delivery was absolute and could not be recalled. Williams v. Latham, 113 Mo. 174; Sneathen v. Sneathen, 104 Mo. 209; 18 C. J. par. 113, p. 208; Seibel v. Higham, 216 Mo. 132; 2 Jones on Real Property (1896 Ed.), p. 220, par. 1309. (3) Much more is presumed in favor of the delivery of the deed in cases of voluntary settlement upon members of the grantor's family, than is presumed between strangers. Crowder v. Searcy, 103 Mo. 118; Rumsey v. Otis, 133 Mo. 95; Schooler v. Schooler, 258 Mo. 92. (4) In an action at law, if there were any legal grounds supported by substantial evidence, which justifies the court's findings, the judgment must be affirmed. Thompson v. Stillwell, 253 Mo. 94. (5) The court was not in error in refusing to permit the witness Anderson to testify that he held the deed as agent for the grantor.
OPINION
This is a suit brought under Section 2535, Revised Statutes, 1909 (now Sec. 1970, R. S. 1919), to try and determine the title to certain land in Knox County. On a trial to the court there was a judgment for the defendant, from which plaintiffs have appealed.
William T. Meredith, the common source of title, died intestate, without issue, May 29, 1917. The plaintiffs are his only heirs, and the defendant is his widow. On March 15, 1916, he executed and delivered to the cashier of a bank at Knox City a warrant deed conveying to his wife, the defendant, for a valuable consideration, the land in controversy. At the time of the execution of this deed the grantor gave certain instructions to the cashier as to its disposition. These instructions were at the time reduced to writing by the cashier, and upon being approved and signed by the grantor were enclosed in a sealed envelope with the deed and, as directed, deposited in the vault of the bank. These instructions are as follows:
The grantor never had the deed in his possession or attempted to secure possession of it or made any inquiries concerning it after he delivered it to the cashier. On the day succeeding the grantor's death, the cashier delivered the deed to the defendant, pursuant to the instructions of the grantor. Subsequent declarations by the grantor to others several months after the execution and deposit of the deed were to the effect that he had deeded everything he had to his wife and at his death he wanted her to have it.
Testimony on the part of plaintiffs was to the effect that after the making of the deed the grantor continued until the time of his death to lease, cultivate and otherwise control the land conveyed. The relation sustained to the grantor by the cashier before, at the time of and subsequent to the execution of the deed is thus described by the latter: It was attempted to be proved on a cross-examination of the cashier by plaintiff's counsel, but excluded, that the cashier was the agent of the grantor in all of the business transacted for the grantor by him. In addition, the cashier testified that if the grantor had, subsequent to the execution of the deed, asked to withdraw it, he thought he would have permitted him to do so. Testimony was also offered, but excluded, to show by the cashier that in all these transactions he was acting as the adviser and business friend of the grantor, and that he knew nothing of and had no business relations with the grantee and that in the matter of the deed he was acting as agent and solely for the grantor.
I. The intention of the grantor in executing the deed to his wife and depositing the same in the bank for delivery to her upon his death is to be determined from not only his acts and declarations but as in any other case in which it is sought to define a purpose from all of the other relevant facts and circumstances. The physical delivery of the deed to the bank and the grantor's contemporaneous and subsequent declarations in regard thereto, as well as his express written directions prepared at his instance and deposited with the deed, offer cogent evidence of such a delivery as the law contemplates in effecting a conveyance of real estate. It is true the cashier occupied a relation to the grantor somewhat in the nature of an intermediary, but in the light of his testimony and other pertinent facts, it does not appear that he was other than an instrumentality acting for the grantor to effect the transfer and to authorize the bank to accept and hold the deed until the grantor's death whereupon the legal delivery of the deed, if then consummated, would become actual by its physical transfer to the grantee. While the oral declarations and physical acts of the grantor are, in our opinion, ample to prove the grantor's intention to deliver the deed, his written declarations add to their probative force, and at the same time, by the very terms of the directions, define the relation of the bank to the relator and dissipate the assumption sought to be established as a fact that it was the grantor's purpose in the making and...
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