Maul v. Rider

• Decision Date: 05 January 1869
• Citation: 59 Pa. 167
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court
• Parties: Maul and Wife <I>versus</I> Rider.

Page 167

59 Pa. 167

Maul and Wife versus Rider.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

October 19 and 20, 1868.

January 5, 1869.

October 19th and 20th 1868.

Before THOMPSON, C. J., READ, AGNEW and SHARSWOOD, JJ.

Error to the Court of Common Pleas of Jefferson county: Of October and November Term 1867, No. 128.

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D. Barclay (with whom were Smullen, Jenks and Winslow), for the plaintiffs in error, referred to the Act of April 22d 1856, § 6, Pamph. L. 532, Purd. 654, pl. 13; Pennock v. Freeman, 1 Watts 401; Maul v. Rider, 1 P. F. Smith 377, 385; Mullock v. Souder, 5 W. & S. 198; Martindale v. Warner, 3 Harris 471; Miller v. Franciscus, 4 Wright 335 W. P. Jenks (with whom was G. A. Jenks), for defendant in error, referred to Act of 1856; Maul v. Rider, supra; Rider v. Maul, 10 Wright 376; Warfield v. Fox, 3 P. F. Smith 382.

The opinion of the court was delivered, January 5th 1869, by SHARSWOOD, J.

This cause has been in this court by writ of error twice, and is reported in 10 Wright 376 and in 1 P. F. Smith 377. The principal points of contention were settled in those cases and we see no reason to review them. They dispose of all the errors now assigned except the 3d, 5th and 6th.

It was decided that there was evidence of a fraud in Rider, from which a trust ex maleficio resulted, of which the plaintiff Mrs. Maul could avail herself, unless she was barred by the limitation provided by the 6th section of the Act of April 22d 1856, Pamph. L. 532. That section limits to five years the time within which an action may be brought to enforce any implied or resulting trust as to realty, "provided that as to any one affected with a trust by reason of his fraud, the said limitation shall begin to run only from the discovery thereof, or when by reasonable diligence the party defrauded might have discovered the same." In Maul v. Rider, 1 P. F. Smith 377, the judgment below was reversed, because from one of the answers to the plaintiffs' points the jury might have understood that there was no such fraud as raised a trust, unless Rider undertook to act as agent for Jacobs. "The legal title to the land," said Mr. Justice Strong, "was not acquired from the Latimers until January 19th 1853. Of course there could have been no trust of that before that time. But Jacobs died in 1849. He never, therefore, had any knowledge of the fraudulent acquisition, or any means of knowledge. When he died, his daughter the plaintiff was a minor, and she did not attain her majority until December 5th 1855, within five years from the time when this action was brought. I find no evidence that she ever knew of the fraudulent acquisition of the title before she came of age, or before this suit was brought or evidence that reasonable diligence would have revealed the fraud to her. It is true, the court was not asked to charge that there was no such evidence, and here is the difficulty, had they been so asked they could not have refused." The only new fact bearing on this question, which appears on this record, and which did not appear before, is that the conveyance of the legal title, — the deed of January 19th 1853, E. & M. Latimer to John Rider, was recorded September 28th 1854. In answer to the plaintiff's 4th point, that there was no evidence that the plaintiff had notice or might have discovered the fraud with reasonable diligence, the court answered, "We think the recording of his deed by Rider in 1854, showing the whole of the title being in the defendant, would be such a publication of holding adverse to the plaintiff as ought to have put her upon inquiry, and that by reasonable diligence she might have discovered." The same instruction is in substance repeated in the answers to the plaintiff's 7th and the defendant's 1st point. These answers are the subject of the 3d, 5th and 6th errors assigned.

It is sometimes said that the record of a deed is constructive notice to all the world. That, it is evident, is too broad and unqualified an enunciation of the doctrine. It is constructive notice only to those who are bound to search for it: thus subsequent purchasers and mortgagees, and perhaps all others who deal with or on the credit of the title, in the line of which the recorded deed belongs. But strangers to the title are in no way affected by it. Thus it has been held that the record of a deed between third persons is no notice to a purchaser at sheriff's sale who does not claim through or under that deed: Keller v. Nutz, 5 S. & R. 246.

If conveyances from one stranger to another would be notice to all the...