Jones v. Jones

• Decision Date: 30 April 1906
• Citation: 41 So. 373,88 Miss. 784
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: ANDREW JONES v. FREDERICK JONES

41 So. 373

88 Miss. 784

ANDREW JONES v. FREDERICK JONES

Supreme Court of Mississippi

April 30, 1906

FROM the chancery court of Madison county, HON. ROBERT B. MAYES Chancellor.

Frederick Jones, the appellee, was complainant in the court below Andrew Jones, the appellant, was defendant there. From a decree in complainant's favor the defendant appealed to the supreme court.

Reuben Jones, deceased, who in his lifetime owned a tract of land died leaving a will by which he devised the dwelling house in which his wife, whom he had abandoned, lived, to her, and his other lands to his brother Frederick. The widow renounced the will and instituted a suit in chancery to obtain her full share of her deceased husband's estate. Finally, in order to get the suit dismissed, Frederick Jones agreed to convey to Andrew Jones, an illegitimate son of Reuben Jones deceased, ninety acres of the land. A tract of ten acres with a house on it was selected, and another tract supposed to contain eighty acres was designated and pointed out. The deed to the second tract called for eighty acres, and after the deeds had been executed to both tracts, Frederick Jones claimed to have discovered that the second tract contained only sixty-two acres, and that the eighty-acre conveyance which he had made to Andrew Jones included eighteen acres of land which he, Frederick, was working and did not wish to surrender. He thereupon filed his bill for reformation.

Decree reversed, cause remanded, and bill ordered dismissed.

J. B Chrisman, for appellant.

Mutual mistakes not only ought to be remedied by a court of equity, but the mutual mistake may be shown by parol evidence. But this jurisdiction of the chancery court has certain limitations, without which, written contracts, mortgages, and deeds would be a mockery. So revolutionary a remedy has fixed and settled boundaries beyond which the chancery court will not go in the exercise of its power.

If anything is settled by the testimony in this case, it is that the leading intent and purpose of Andrew Jones, defendant, in which complainant concurred, was that defendant should acquire ninety acres of land.

It is abundantly shown that both of the parties' minds were directed to this feature of the transaction. It does not matter that they were mistaken as to where the line run. Their minds were not fixed on the line.

The court will only decree a reformation of a deed where the mistake is mutual. In other words, it will not alter a deed to conform to the understanding of one of the parties, which is contrary to the understanding of the other. Williams v. Hamilton, 65 Am. St. Rep., 310; 20 Am. & Eng. Ency. Law (2d ed.), 812.

A court of equity will not reform a deed in favor of a party who has been negligent, and stood upon an equal footing, and had the same opportunity to ascertain the facts that his adversary had. Golden v. State, 63 Miss. 468; Wilczinski v. Louisville, etc., R. Co., 66 Miss. 610; Oswald v. McGehee, 28 Miss. 340; 2 Pomeroy Eq. Jur., 839-860; 20 Am. & Eng. Ency. Law (2d ed.), 811; 24 Am. & Eng. Ency. Law (2d ed.), 656; 1 Story on Eq. Jur., 200.

H. B. Greaves, for appellee.

The principles of law here involved are plain, unambiguous, and the only grounds for any disagreements is upon the weight of evidence, the question of facts involved, and character and strength of evidence offered--the burden being on us.

For a case peculiarly like this one I cite the court to Butler v. Barnes, 12 L. R. A., 273, where the parties, as in this case, actually viewed the premises, and executed a deed which they thought covered the ground actually viewed pointed out, and agreed upon to be conveyed, but the deed, in reality, covered more land, as was afterwards ascertained. Johnson v. Tober, 10 N.Y. 319; Pequer...