Harton v. Amason

• Decision Date: 03 February 1916
• Docket Number: 6 Div. 174
• Citation: 195 Ala. 594,71 So. 180
• Parties: HARTON et al. v. AMASON.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

71 So. 180

195 Ala. 594

HARTON et al. v. AMASON.

6 Div. 174

Supreme Court of Alabama

February 3, 1916

Appeal from Chancery Court, Jefferson County; A.H. Benners Chancellor.

Suit by S.C.M. Amason against H.M. Harton and others. From decree overruling demurrers to the bill, respondents appeal. Reversed and remanded.

The bill alleges the employment by Harton of orator as an attorney to advise him as to his rights against the other respondents to this cause, or some of them, and that Harton authorized the institution and prosecution of a certain suit in the chancery court of Jefferson county against all the respondents to this suit, together with one Lula B. Harton said cause being numbered 5443, in said chancery court; (2) that orator and Harton, on April 15, 1910, entered into a certain written contract of that date, as to the terms of orator's employment with relation to said suit, and the fee he was to receive for the services rendered therein, a copy of which is attached and marked "Exhibit A." The bill then gives the history of the work done, and the appeals prosecuted from the decrees rendered. It is then alleged that while said last appeal was pending, as aforesaid, Harton, with orator's consent, entered into negotiations with defendants, or some of them, for a settlement of the litigation, and later orator was informed by the solicitors of record for respondent, and also by Harton, that the negotiations had resulted in an agreement for settlement between them, and later, in May, 1915, an instrument, setting forth the terms of said agreement for settlement, was submitted to orator for his approval by counsel of record for respondent, which instrument already bore the signature of said Harton, as well as those of the several respondents, and your orator on, to wit, May 3, 1915 indorsed thereon the following words: "I hereby consent to the foregoing agreement of settlement." A copy of the agreement is made Exhibit B. Orator further shows that afterwards, and in furtherance of said settlement, the respondents Enslen, Johnson, and the Empire Realty Company either separately or jointly, executed to defendant Windsor Realty & Trust Company deeds purporting to convey to such company all the property recited in said agreement of settlement, which respondents had obligated themselves therein to convey to Harton, or to the said Windsor Realty & Trust Company, as the said Harton should require, and the title to all of said property now appears by the record in the office of the judge of probate of Jefferson county, to remain in the said Windsor Realty & Trust Company. It is alleged, further, that Harton had refused to pay him for his services as counselor and solicitor under the contract; that complainant had never compounded with him for the same, and that the deeds to the property were executed to the said Windsor Realty & Trust Company without orator's consent; and that orator has never consented to it being conveyed by respondents to anybody, even to said Harton, before orator's fee for his services should have been paid or otherwise secured to said orator than by the statutory lien in favor of attorneys at law; and that the said Windsor Realty & Trust Company is chargeable with full knowledge that orator has not been paid or settled with for his said fees, because Harton is and has always been president of said corporation, and said corporation is, as orator verily believes, a mere volunteer to the title of said property. The bill was afterwards amended by alleging that the suit was for money, among other things, and the prayer was amended by praying in the alternative that the conveyance of the lands under the direction of defendant Harton to defendant Windsor Realty & Trust Company, before orator's claim was satisfied, was a fraud against orator, and that for that reason the said Windsor Realty & Trust Company holds title to said land as a trustee to satisfy the claims of orator as a creditor of defendant. The substance of the agreement sufficiently appears.

Stokely, Scrivner & Dominick, of Birmingham, for appellants.

Henry Upson Sims, of Birmingham, for appellee.

McCLELLAN J.

The appellee, an attorney at law and solicitor in equity, filed this bill, against appellants and others, to have declared and enforced his right to compensation for services rendered by him under written contract with his client (appellant) H.M. Harton, in litigation instituted by said Harton. The dominant purpose of the bill is that just stated. All other matters with respect to which relief is sought are but incidental to the major purpose of the bill. In the written contract between appellee and Harton the measure of appellee's compensation was fixed at a "sum of money equal to one-fifth the value of fifty shares of the capital stock, including all accrued dividends due and payable thereon, or that may become due and payable on the same, of the Ensley Realty Company, on the rendition of a final decree in said suit, *** or upon the compromise and settlement of said suit, if the same should be compromised and settled without being prosecuted to a final decree," further providing a limitation on the compensation to $10,000. The agreement did not purport to satisfy the appellee's charge for compensation out of the shares of stock of the corporation. The contract, ex vi termini, did not impose a charge upon the shares of stock to assure the payment of the appellee's compensation for professional services. The only effect of the allusion to the capital stock was to measure the amount of the appellee's compensation. The litigation and all related, assumed, or anticipated bases of claim or controversy were compromised and settled by all the parties concerned in the assertions of right or claim made by Harton; the formally executed written agreement to that end being exhibited with the bill. No final decree consistent...