Crow v. Hardridge
| Decision Date | 22 September 1914 |
| Docket Number | Case Number: 5403 |
| Citation | 1914 OK 431,143 P. 183,43 Okla. 463 |
| Parties | CROW v. HARDRIDGE. |
| Court | Oklahoma Supreme Court |
¶0 1. APPEAL AND ERROR--Parties--Joint Judgment. All parties against whom a joint judgment has been rendered must be made parties to a proceeding in error to reverse such judgment, and a failure to join any of them, either as plaintiff or defendant, is ground for dismissal of the case.
2. QUIETING TITLE--Parties. In a suit to set aside one deed on the ground of the minority of the grantor and for fraud in the grantee, and another on the ground that his grantee took title to the land with knowledge of and participating in the fraud, both the grantor and grantee in the second deed are necessary parties to a suit to clear both deeds as a cloud on plaintiff's title and necessary parties in this court to review a judgment granting such relief.
Jay A. Anderson and H. E. Smith, for plaintiff in error.
James M. Hays, for defendant in error.
¶1 On January 31, 1911, Edmond Hardridge, an Indian minor, by his next friend, filed his petition in the district court of Okmulgee county, against Lewis B. Malone, seeking to quiet the title to his allotment in the Creek Nation. He alleged he was a minor at the time the deed sought to be set aside was made, and that Malone had acquired said deed by fraud. In his amended petition, in which he makes Crow a party defendant, he alleges that Malone had since deeded the land to Crow, who took the same with knowledge of and participated in the fraud. He prayed that both deeds be set aside. After demurrers filed and overruled, Malone filed separate answer, in effect a general denial, and based his title thereto upon the first deed, which was executed and delivered to him on December 26, 1908, by said Hardridge and his wife. Thereafter Crow filed his separate answer, in effect a general denial, and set forth a deed from Malone to himself, and prayed that his title to the land be quieted. There was trial to the court, and judgment for plaintiff, clearing his title of both deeds, and defendant Crow brings the case here without making Malone a party. Defendant in error has filed his motion to dismiss on the ground that Malone is a necessary party, in that the judgment sought to be reviewed is a joint judgment against Crow and Malone. The point is well taken. Malone, as Crow's immediate grantor, was a necessary party in the court below to set aside his deed to Crow. Hitchcox v. Hitchcox et al., 39 W. Va. 607, 20 S.E. 595, was a suit in equity commenced by Victor Hitchcox, a minor, to remove a deed, held by defendants, as a cloud on his title to certain land. In his bill he assailed the validity of the title of defendant's immediate grantor, one A. S. Core, who was not made a party to the suit. The circuit court decreed that Victor Hitchcox was entitled to the relief prayed for in his bill, and removed the deed to said Core, and also the deed from Core to defendants, as a cloud on plaintiff's title. The defendants appealed and assigned as error the action of the trial court in so decreeing in the absence of necessary parties. In passing the court said:
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