Childress Oil Co. v. Wood

• Decision Date: 20 April 1921
• Docket Number: (No. 2861.)
• Citation: 230 S.W. 143
• Parties: CHILDRESS OIL CO. v. WOOD.
• Court: Texas Supreme Court

Page 143

230 S.W. 143

CHILDRESS OIL CO. v. WOOD.

(No. 2861.)

Supreme Court of Texas.

April 20, 1921.

Certified Questions from Court of Civil Appeals of Second Supreme Judicial District.

Suit by O. E. Wood against the Childress Oil Company in the Justice Court. Judgment for plaintiff. Defendant appealed to county court, where plaintiff attempted to dismiss as to the lien and its foreclosure, and prosecuted the suit only for debt and attorney's fee. Judgment was rendered for the plaintiff which was reversed upon defendant's appeal to the Court of Civil Appeals, and the matter was certified to Supreme Court. Judgment of Court of Civil Appeals affirmed.

Jos. H. Aynesworth, of Wichita Falls, for appellant.

Ed Yarbrough, of Electra, and E. W. Napier, of Wichita Falls, for appellee.

PHILLIPS, C. J.

The suit was one by O. E. Wood against the Childress Oil Company in the Justice Court to recover on a claim of $178.50 for labor performed for the defendant and an additional statutory attorney's fee of $20, and to foreclose a laborer's lien upon machinery, tools and material belonging to the defendant. The value of the property upon which foreclosure of the lien was sought was not alleged by the plaintiff, but the defendant pleaded that its value exceeded $200 and that therefore the Justice Court was without jurisdiction. The plaintiff prevailed in the Justice Court, and on the defendant's appeal to the County Court it was agreed between the parties that the value of the property upon which the lien was asserted in the Justice Court exceeded $200. In the County Court the plaintiff attempted to dismiss so much of his action as pertained to the lien and its foreclosure and prosecuted his suit only for the debt and attorney's fee. Judgment was there rendered only for the debt and attorney's fee.

The Honorable Court of Civil Appeals reversed this judgment and directed the dismissal of the case, holding that the jurisdiction of the Justice Court was determined by the value of the property upon which the lien was asserted, and that since the Justice Court had no jurisdiction the County Court had none.

The question certified is whether its action was correct.

We answer that it was. The jurisdiction of the County Court in cases appealed from the Justice Court is dependent absolutely upon the jurisdiction of the Justice Court. If the Justice Court is without jurisdiction there can be no jurisdiction in the County Court. While the case is tried de novo in the County Court, its power is not original. The case is there only in virtue of the appeal. With this true, its power to determine it on the appeal cannot exist if the original tribunal had no power to consider it.

The jurisdiction of the Justice Court is necessarily determined by the cause of action, there asserted, and not merely by a part of the cause of action. If as so determined it is without jurisdiction, the abandonment of a part of the cause of action in the County Court cannot create jurisdiction in the latter.

The cause of action in the Justice Court, here, being not simply for debt but for the foreclosure of a lien on personal property, as well, the jurisdiction of the court was necessarily dependent upon the value of the property thus brought into controversy and sought to be subjected to judgment. The value of the property so brought into the suit admittedly exceeded the amount of the court's lawful jurisdiction. The abandonment of the lien in the County Court did not, therefore, save the County Court's jurisdiction.

The question is directly ruled by Cotulla v. Goggan & Bros., 77 Tex. 32, 13 S. W. 742. There, the suit in the Justice Court was for...