Dowling v. Duke
| Decision Date | 01 January 1857 |
| Citation | 20 Tex. 181 |
| Parties | JOSIAH DOWLING v. THOMAS M. DUKE. |
| Court | Texas Supreme Court |
An administrator cannot maintain a suit on a note given for the purchase money of land sold by him at public sale, while he fails and refuses to return the sale and have it confirmed.
Error from Lavacca. Tried below before the Hon. Fielding Jones.
Suit by defendant in error, commenced March 10th, 1856, against plaintiff in error and Thomas A. Hester, on their joint and several promissory note for $780, dated October 4, 1854, and payable on the first day of October, 1855. Answer by defendants as follows:
And now come the defendants, and for answer deny all and singular the allegations set forth in plaintiff's petition, except such as are hereinafter admitted; and for further answer defendants say that it is true that they did on or about the 4th day of October 1854, execute unto the said Duke their promissory note for $780; that the said Duke represented himself as administrator of the estate of Joseph Hall, deceased; and under said representation as said administrator, exposed to public sale a certain tract of land being and situated in the county of Lavacca, state aforesaid; and defendants being the highest bidders became the purchasers of said land for the sum of seven hundred and eighty dollars, for which amount they executed said note and also executed to the said Duke a mortgage on said land for the payment of the same; a certified copy of which mortgage is hereto attached and asked to be made a part of this petition. Your defendants further say that said Duke has never made a return of the sale of said land to the county court of Matagorda, that granted (if such order ever was made) the order as the law requires. Nor has the said county court ever confirmed the sale of said land, as sold by said Duke; but the said Duke hath wholly failed and refused to comply with the requirements of the statutes in regard to probate sales of land. They further state that the said Duke as aforesaid, has never made nor offered to make unto said defendants a good and valid deed to said tract of land, although defendants have always been and are now ready and willing to pay the said amount of said note upon the said Duke complying as aforesaid with the statutes as aforesaid, and making to your defendants a good and valid title to the land aforesaid; all of which the said Duke has refused and still refuses to do, to the great damage of defendants, to wit: the sum of five...
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Allen v. Atchison
...vendees did not, at the expiration of the credit, pay the remainder of the purchase money, the law pointed out the proper remedy. Dowling v. Duke, 20 Tex. 181. The law provides that if the administratrix disposed of the property on a credit without good security, that it would be at her own......
- Hall v. Dorithy Morrison's Adm'r.