Livingston Cnty. v. Morris
| Decision Date | 30 April 1880 |
| Citation | 71 Mo. 603 |
| Parties | LIVINGSTON COUNTY v. MORRIS, Appellant. |
| Court | Missouri Supreme Court |
Appeal from Livingston Circuit Court--HON. E. J. BROADDUS, dge.
REVERSED.
Pollard & Chapman for appellant.
Davis & Wait for respondent.
This is a suit in ejectment for the recovery of the possession of land in Livingston county; the petition being in the usual form. The answer is a general denial. Plaintiff obtained judgment, from which the defendant appealed. On the trial defendant objected to the introduction of any evidence, because the petition did not state a cause of action, in this, that the land sued for was so vaguely described that it could not be identified. This objection was overruled, and the action of the trial court in that respect is assigned as the principal ground of error. The petition described the land sued for as follows: “All that part of the east half of the northwest quarter of the southwest quarter of section 20, township 57, range 24, containing sixteen acres more or less.
We think it is clear that in an ejectment suit the land sued for must be so described that, in the event of a recovery, an officer charged with the execution of a writ of possession would know, and be informed by it what land it was his duty to put the plaintiff in possession of. As a judgment in plaintiff's favor would have to describe the land as it is described in the petition, and as the description in an execution issued thereon would follow that contained in the judgment, the officer charged with the duty of executing it could not know from such a description, even with the aid of the most skillful surveyor, what land to take from the possession of the defendant and deliver the possession of to plaintiff. The description of the premises set out in the petition is so vague, uncertain and indefinite as to render its identification by an officer impossible, and for this reason the objection of defendant to the introduction of any evidence under the petition ought to have been sustained.
It appears from the evidence which the court received that plaintiff's title to the land is based upon a sheriff's deed conveying the land by the same description contained in the petition, and that it had been sold by him in pursuance of a power contained in a mortgage given to Livingston county to secure school money borrowed by one Matson, the owner of the land. Matson was introduced as a witness, for the purpose of identifying the land and showing that the description in the deed applied to sixteen...
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Hecker v. Bleish
...judgment would have been so indefinite and uncertain in its description of the land as to render it void for uncertainty. [Livingston County v. Morris, 71 Mo. 603; Robertson v. Drane, 100 Mo. 273; Franklin v. Haynes, 139 Mo. 311; Bricken v. Cross, 140 Mo. 166; Collins v. Andriano, 264 Mo. 4......
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Hecker v. Bleish
... ... uncertain in its description of the land as to render it void ... for uncertainty. [ Livingston County v. Morris, 71 ... Mo. 603; Robertson v. Drane, 100 Mo. 273; ... Franklin v. Haynes, ... ...
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Hecker v. Bleish
...it is at the top of the high bank, the bottom of the high bank or at the point which was the last thread of the stream. Livingston Co. v. Morris, 71 Mo. 603; Brummell v. Harris, 148 Mo. 430; Benne v. Miller, 149 Mo. 228; Bricker v. Cross, 140 Mo. 166. E. E. Richards and Mayer, Conkling & Sp......
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Wilkinson v. Lieberman
...in any event, and a verdict for plaintiffs would have been void because the petition describes no definite tract of land. Livingston Co. v. Morris, 71 Mo. 603; Bricken v. Cross, 140 Mo. 166; Collins Andriano, 264 Mo. 475; Burns v. Liberty, 131 Mo. 373; McDermott v. Doyle, 11 Mo. 443; Robert......