Johnson v. Harmon

• Decision Date: 01 October 1876
• Citation: 94 U.S. 371,24 L.Ed. 271
• Parties: JOHNSON v. HARMON
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

94 U.S. 371

24 L.Ed. 271

JOHNSON v. HARMON.

October Term, 1876

APPEAL from the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia.

The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.

Argued by Mr. A. G. Riddle for the appellant.

The court declined to hear Mr. M. Thompson for the appellee.

MR. JUSTICE BRADLEY delivered the opinion of the court.

This was a bill in equity, involving, amongst other questions, the validity of a trust deed given by the complainant (the appellee here) to secure certain notes. The complainant charges in his bill that he was so intoxicated when he executed the deed and notes as to be incapable of understanding what he was doing. The court below, after considerable testimony had been tak n, directed an issue to try the question whether the complainant, at the time of the execution of the deed of trust and notes, was capable of executing a valid deed or contract. The issue so directed was tried, and resulted in a verdict for the complainant; namely, that he was not capable of executing a valid deed or contract. The defendants took a bill of exceptions to the charge given by the judge who tried the issue, which was allowed, and signed by him. The cause afterwards came on to be heard upon the exceptions, and they were overruled. Subsequently a final hearing was had upon the pleadings, evidence, and verdict, and a decree was rendered for the complainant, directing the trust deed and notes in question to be vacated and set aside. From that decree this appeal was taken, and the only errors assigned are to the charge given by the judge to the jury on the trial of the feigned issue.

This is totally inadmissible. A bill of exceptions cannot be taken on the trial of a feigned issue directed by a court of equity, or, if taken, can only be used on a motion for a new trial made to said court. 2 Dan. Ch. Pr. (3d Am. ed.) 1106; Armstrong v. Armstrong, 3 Myl. & K. 52; Ex parte Story, 12 Pet. 343. See the cases on new trials on feigned issues collected in 3 Graham & Waterman on New Trials, 1553, &c. The issue is directed to be tried for the purpose of informing the conscience of the Chancellor, and aiding him to come to a proper conclusion. If he thinks the trial has not been a fair one, or for any other reason desires a new trial, it is in his discretion to order it. But he may proceed with the cause though dissatisfied with the verdict, and make a decree contrary thereto, if in his judgment the law and the evidence so requires. A decree in equity, therefore, when appealed from, does not stand or fall according to the legality or illegality of the proceedings on the trial of a feigned issue in the cause; for the verdict may or may not have been the ground of the decree. It is the duty of the court of first instance to decide (as was done here) upon the whole case, pleadings, evidence, and verdict, giving to the latter so much effect as it is worth. An appeal from the decree must be decided in the same way, namely, upon the whole case, and cannot be made to turn on the correctness or incorrectness of the judge's rulings at the trial of the feigned issue.

Decree affirmed.

MR. JUSTICE CLIFFORD concurred in the judgment of the court, and delivered the following opinion:——

Difficulty attends the effort to define, with clearness and precision, what degree of mental unsoundness in a grantor is sufficient, in contemplation of law, to render him incapable of giving a valid and effectual deed of conveyance. Confirmed insanity which deprives a person of mental capacity to distinguish between right and wrong, in respect to the act in question, renders the person irresponsible for such an act, though criminal, and disqualifies him to enter into a contract or to execute a valid instrument to convey real or personal estate.

Deeds made by such a person are at least voidable; but mere weakness of understanding is not of itself any objection to the validity of a contract, if the capacity remains to see things in their true relations, and to form correct conclusions in respect to the subject-matter of the contract.

Men of such understanding are held responsible for criminal acts, and they may make valid contracts; but when it appears that a contractor or grantor has not strength of mind and reason sufficient to understand the nature and consequences of his act in making a contract or in executing a deed, the instrument may be avoided, on the ground of the mental incapacity of the party to contract or to execute the conveyance.

Both minds must meet in such a transaction; and if one is so weak, unsound, and diseased that the party is incapable of understanding the nature and quality of the act to be performed, or its consequences, he is incompetent to assent to the terms a d conditions of the instrument, whether that state of his mind was produced by mental or physical disease, and whether it resulted from ordinary sickness, or from accident, or from debauchery, or from habitual and protracted intemperance. Dennett v. Dennett, 44 N. H. 535; 2 Kent, Com. (12th ed.) 45.

Enough appears to show that the complainant owned lot numbered twenty-six, described in the record, with the two dwelling-houses erected thereon; that on the 3d of February, 1871, he indorsed two notes of that date, each for the sum of three hundred dollars, payable one in five and the other in six months from date, with ten per cent interest, to the order of the first-named respondent; and that he, on the same day, executed and delivered to the other respondent a deed of conveyance of the houses and lot in trust to suffer and permit the complainant to occupy and enjoy the premises until some default made in the payment of those two promissory notes, with power in the trustee, in case of default of payment, to proceed, on the request of the payee of the notes, to sell the premises. Default of payment of the first note was made, and complainant alleges, in his original bill of complaint, that the trustee threatens to sell the premises. Subsequently he, by leave of court, filed an amended bill of complaint.

Reference will only be made to the amended bill, as the matters in controversy arose out of charges contained in that pleading, which are as follows: That when the complainant executed the deed of trust and the notes he was so intoxicated that he did not know what he was doing; that he did not know that he was making his property liable for the notes, or that he was incurring any obligation to pay the notes; that the trustee, on the 21st of September last, sold the property at public auction to the payee of the notes, and that he claims the property as his own, and has given the complainant notice to leave the premises.

Based upon these allegations, and others not necessary to be reproduced, the complainant prays as follows: 1. That the sale to the payee of the notes may be annulled and set aside. 2. That the trustee may be enjoined and restrained from making any conveyance of the premises to any person. 3. That if the trustee has made any conveyance of the same, that the conveyance may be annulled and set aside. 4. That the deed of trust may be decreed null and void. 5. That the payee of the notes may be enjoined and restrained from taking possession, or in any way interfering with the premises or with the complainant, or any tenant thereof, in the free use and enjoyment of the property; and for general relief.

Process was issued; and the first-named respondent appeared and filed a separate answer, which consists of a denial of every allegation of the bill of complaint, together with two affirmative averments: 1. That the complainant several times asked for extension of time for the payment of the notes. 2. That he, the respondent, saw no signs of intoxication in the complainant at the time the notes and deed of trust were executed, and that he never set up any such pretence before the first note was sued.

Proofs were taken, and it appears that the cause was submitted to the court upon the pleadings and evidence without argument. Before decision, the court directed that a feigned issue should be tried by a jury in the law court of the District, as follows, to wit: whether or not the complainant at the time the deed of trust and notes were executed was capable of executing a valid deed or contract.

Pending that proceeding, the complainant filed in the equity court a supplemental bill, in which he alleged that the jury empanelled to try the feigned issue failed to agree, and that the issue was still pending in the law court; that the payee of the notes brought suit against him before a justice of the peace to obtain possession of the premises; that he recovered judgment in the case, and that the present complainant appealed the same to the Supreme Court of the District that the appellee in that suit, notwithstanding the pendency of the feigned issue in the court of law, caused the appeal from the judgment rendered by the justice of the peace to the docketed and affirmed, without evidence or inquiry into the merits. Wherefore he prayed that the writ of possession might be annulled and set aside, and for an injunction.

Instead of that, the court first issued a summons commanding the respondents to appear and answer the allegations of the supplemental bill. Service being made, the first-named respondent appeared and filed an answer, in which he admits that the complainant did set up the defence of intoxication in the suit on the note; that he, the present respondent, did obtain judgment for possession; but he avers that the appeal was never perfected, and that the judgment of the justice of the peace was affirmed. Hearing was had; and the court awarded an injunction restraining the respondent from interfering with the property, but requiring the complainant to give bond to pay rent, in case the final decree should be in favor of the respondent.

Those matters being adjusted, the parties went to trial upon the feigned issue in the court of law,...