Hart v. Sansom

• Decision Date: 21 January 1884
• Citation: Hart v. Sansom, 110 U.S. 151, 3 S.Ct. 586, 28 L.Ed. 101 (1884)
• Parties: HART. v. SANSOM and others
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

110 U.S. 151

3 S.Ct. 586

28 L.Ed. 101

HART.v.SANSOM and others.

January 21, 1884.

Henry J. Leovy and W. Hallett Phillips, for plaintiff in error.

A. S. Lathrop, for defendants in error.

GRAY, J.

This is a writ of error sued out by Edmond J. Hart, a citizen of Lo isiana, to reverse a judgment rendered against him in the circuit court of the United States for the Northern district of Texas, in an action brought by him against Marion Sansom and the heirs at law of Thomas M. League, citizens of Texas, to recover a tract of land in Johnson county, in that state, of which they had dispossessed him.At the trial, Hart proved his title under a patent from the republic of Texas to League, and a deed with general covenants of warranty from League, dated August 19, 1846, and both recorded on December 9, 1879, and it appeared that the defendant Sansom held possession of the land under a lease from the other defendants and as their tenant.The defendants offered in evidence the record of a judgment rendered by the district court of Johnson county, on August 24, 1875, upon a petition filed June 11, 1873, by the heirs at law of League, (who died intestate November 5, 1865,) against Virgil Wilkerson, Orlando Dorsey, and several other persons, and Hart, alleging that Wilkerson ejected the plaintiffs from this land, and unlawfully withheld possession thereof from them; that on October 29, 1870, the defendant Dorsey, by deed duly recorded, conveyed to some of the other defendants than Wilkerson and Hart three-fourths of the land, reserving in that deed the remaining fourth to himself, and that other deeds (particularly set forth) of parts of the land were afterwards made to the rest of such other defendants and recorded; that the defendant Hart 'sets up some pretended claim and title to said land;' and that 'the defendant Wilkerson is a naked trespasser upon the land of the plaintiffs, and that the several other defendants' several deeds, which appear upon the record of deeds of Johnson county as aforesaid, are fraudulent and void, and that the said pretended claims and deeds, and each and all of them, cast a cloud upon the title of the plaintiffs;' and praying 'that they have judgment that the cloud upon the title of the plaintiffs, created by the several deeds aforesaid, be removed, and that the said deeds, and each and all of them, be declared null and void, and be canceled and dis- charged of record, and that the title of the plaintiffs in and to said premises and every part thereof, may by confirmed and established as against said defendants and each and every of them, and all persons claiming through or under them,' and for a writ of possession, damages, and costs.That record also showed the issue and due service of citations to all the defendants except Dorsey and Hart; the issue of a citation directing the sheriff to serve Hart, being a citizen of Louisiana, by publication, and the sheriff's return showing the execution of the citation by such publication in a newspaper of the county four successive weeks before the return day, and a like service by publication on Dorsey, a citizen of New York.That record further showed a default of all the defendants; and that upon a writ of inquiry the jury assessed damages against Dorsey and Hart; found as facts the issue of the patent to League and the title of the plaintiffs as his heirs; that Hart 'claimed said land;' and that a deed was made by Dorsey and recorded, as alleged in the petition, but that Hart and Dorsey respectively had no title of record or otherwise; and returned a verdict 'for the plaintiffs; and that they recover the land described in the petition.'That record finally showed a judgment 'that the plaintiff's recover of the defendants the premises described,' and 'that the several deeds in the plaintiff's petition mentioned be and the same are hereby annulled and canceled, and for naught held, and the cloud thereby removed,' and for costs, and that execution issue for the costs.The circuit court, against the plaintiff's objection, admitted the judgment in evidence, instructed the jury that it divested the plaintiff of his title to the land, and directed a verdict for the defendants.

The plaintiff, deriving his title under a deed with covenants of general warran y from League, is entitled to maintain this action against League's heirs, who are estopped by those covenants, unless the former judgment in the action brought by them in the state court has adjudicated the title as between them and the present plaintiff.It is therefore necessary to consider the nature and effect of that judgment.The petition combined, in accordance with the practice prevailing in that...