Laurens County Bd. of Ed. v. Stanley

• Decision Date: 25 November 1938
• Docket Number: 12479.
• Parties: LAURENS COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION et al. v. STANLEY et al.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

200 S.E. 294

187 Ga. 389

LAURENS COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION et al. v. STANLEY et al.

No. 12479.

Supreme Court of Georgia

November 25, 1938

Rehearing Denied Dec. 8, 1938.

Error from Superior Court, Laurens County; J. L. Kent, Judge.

Suit by R. M. Stanley and others, as trustees, against Laurens County Board of Education and others to enjoin the defendants from removing a schoolhouse from the premises on which the school was located, and from cutting timber from such premises. To review a judgment granting an injunction, the defendants bring error.

Reversed.

BELL J., dissenting.

On Motion for Rehearing.

Syllabus by the Court.

A petition to enjoin an alleged trespass on realty, which fails to describe the land involved with that degree of certainty that will establish the identity of the land, is insufficient and will be dismissed on general demurrer.

Nelson & Nelson and Carl K. Nelson, all of Dublin, for plaintiffs in error.

Rollin A. Stanley, Palmer W. Hicks, and C. C. Crockett, all of Dublin, for defendants in error.

DUCKWORTH Justice.

Stanley and others as trustees brought suit against the Board of Education of Laurens County and others, seeking to enjoin them from removing a schoolhouse from the premises on which it was located, and from cutting timber therefrom. The petitioners claimed title under a deed, the material portions of the description contained therein being as follows 'ten acres of land which is hereafter to be surveyed leaving said schoolhouse in the center, * * * being parts of two lots of land No. 93 and No. 94 adjoining land of John W. Smith and others.' It was alleged that 'the property now consists of ten acres of valuable land with a school building thereon, and having a large and valuable growth of original pine trees thereon.' The defendants filed demurrers on the grounds that no cause of action was set forth and no title was shown in the petitioners, and that the deed relied on as title was void for vagueness and indefiniteness of description of the property attempted to be conveyed thereby. On interlocutory hearing the demurrers were overruled, and an injunction granted. The defendants excepted.

Where the description in a deed is indefinite, and contains no descriptive terms by the use of which the lands intended to be conveyed can be definitely located and identified, such deed is fatally defective and void. King v. Sears, 91 Ga. 577, 18 S.E. 830; McSwain v. Ricketson, 129 Ga. 176, 58 S.E. 655; Chattahoochee Fertilizer Co. v. Quinn, 169 Ga. 801, 151 S.E. 496; Allen v. Smith, 169 Ga. 395, 150 S.E. 584, citing Luttrell v. Whitehead, 121 Ga. 699, 49 S.E. 691. A deed is not void for the want of description if it furnishes the key to the identification of the land intended to be conveyed. Price v. Gross, 148 Ga. 137, 96 S.E. 4; Hollomon v. Board of Education, 168 Ga. 359, 147 S.E. 882. We are of the opinion that the deed in the instant case furnishes no key for the identification of the land intended to be conveyed, within the meaning of that term as used in the rules last stated. Such terms refer to a state of facts or circumstances existing at the time the deed is executed, and not to what may be the future intention of the grantor as may be...