Mitchell v. Baldwin

• Decision Date: 04 February 1908
• Citation: 45 So. 715,154 Ala. 346
• Parties: MITCHELL ET AL. v. BALDWIN ET AL.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

45 So. 715

154 Ala. 346

MITCHELL ET AL. v. BALDWIN ET AL.

Supreme Court of Alabama

February 4, 1908

Appeal from Chancery Court, Bullock County; W. L. Parks, Chancellor.

Bill by Fannie Charles Mitchell and others against Mary Ellen Baldwin and others to declare certain deeds void and to cancel the same as cloud upon title. From a decree dismissing the bill complainants appeal. Affirmed.

Dowdell Haralson, and McClellan, JJ., dissenting.

The bill alleges that Mrs. Elizabeth Mitchell died in January 1904, leaving surviving her the appellants as her only heirs at law, and leaving also a husband, White Mitchell, who is made a party defendant to the bill; that Mrs. Mitchell during her lifetime was the owner in fee of the lands described that in 1889 she conveyed said lands, being joined therein by her husband, by warranty deed to B. J. Baldwin, her husband joining in the usual covenants of warranty, and again in November, 1892, she conveyed said lands by warranty deeds to B. J. Baldwin, her husband joining in that deed; that in 1893 B. J. Baldwin conveyed said lands for a valuable consideration to F. B. Baldwin; that in 1900 Mrs. Mitchell and her husband executed a deed to said lands to F. B. Baldwin; that at the time each of said deeds were executed Mrs. Elizabeth Mitchell was non compos mentis and incapable of conveying the lands; and that the last-mentioned deed was delivered on Sunday. It is alleged that complainants have brought suit in ejectment for said lands, Mrs. Mitchell dying pending the suit, and that they were defeated on the proposition that White Mitchell, a life tenant, was living, and he was entitled to the possession thereof, if any one other than the holders were. The appellants claim as the heirs of Mrs. Elizabeth Mitchell, and the appellees claim through the will of F. B. Baldwin. The prayer is for a decree that Mrs. Mitchell was non compos mentis at the time of the execution and delivery of the deed, and that said deeds did not pass her title to the grantees, and that upon the termination of the life estate complainants will be entitled to the possession thereof, and that the court will declare such deeds to be void and will cancel same as a cloud upon title of complainants. The respondents made a motion to dismiss their bill for want of equity on the ground of a failure to offer to do equity, and also sustaining demurrers to the bill on the same ground; and from this judgment this appeal is prosecuted.

E. L. Blue and M. M. Ullman, for appellants.

M. M. Baldwin and J. D. Norman, for appellees.

DOWDELL J.

The bill avers that Elizabeth Mitchell, the ancestor of the complainants, was insane at the time of the execution by her of the deeds mentioned to Baldwin, and that the said deeds were and are for that reason absolutely void. This is also the contention of appellants' counsel in brief and argument, citing in support of the contention Dougherty v. Powe, 127 Ala. 577, 30 So. 524, and Wilkinson v. Wilkinson, 129 Ala. 279, 30 So. 578. This contention is sound. The act approved March 2, 1901 (Loc. Laws 1900-01, p. 1943), "to better protect bona fide purchasers of real estate from insane persons without notice of such insanity," being subsequent in its passage to the purchase in the present case, can exert no influence one way or the other.

It is shown by the bill that the respondents are in possession of the land under title from the life tenant, the husband of said Elizabeth. The complainants claim nothing more than a reversionary interest in the land, and under the law their enjoyment of this estate or interest is postponed to the termination or falling in of the life estate. Admitting the facts as averred, the present possession of the respondents, being that of the life tenant, is not adverse to the interest of the complainants as reversioners, and, as no right of action for the recovery of possession by the complainants exists, the statute of limitations does not run and cannot begin to run until such right of action accrues. Pickett v. Pope, 74 Ala. 122; Bass v. Bass, 88 Ala. 408, 7 So. 243; Gindrat v. Western Ry., 96 Ala. 162, 11 So. 372, 19 L. R. A. 839; Washington v. Norwood, 128 Ala. 383, 30 So. 405.

The rule is well established that "a court of equity will not entertain a bill to remove a cloud from the title to land in favor of a person asserting a legal right when he is not in possession, unless he shows some special equity--that is, some obstacle or impediment which would prevent or embarrass the assertion of his rights at law." 3 Mayfield's Dig. p. 197, § 418. In the case before us the existence of the life estate and the possession of the land by the respondents holding under the life tenant is an obstacle or impediment in the way of an assertion by the complainants as reversioners of their legal rights, and under the principle above stated, and on the authority of the case of Lansden v. Bone, 90 Ala. 446, 8 So. 65, the complainants, although out of possession, have a clear right to maintain a bill in equity to remove a cloud from their title in reversion.

On the facts in this case, however, the complainants are confronted with another equitable doctrine; that is, an offer to do equity. There is no fraud nor undue influence charged, or unfairness of any kind or character. So far as the bill shows, the grantee under whom the respondents hold and claim was an innocent purchaser for value, without notice of the alleged insanity of the grantor at the time of the purchase and the execution of the conveyance. The case presented is simply one to have a void deed, void by reason alone of the grantor's insanity, canceled, and the cloud created by it on complainants' title to the land removed. The bill alleges the execution of a warranty deed to the said Baldwin by Elizabeth Mitchell. The execution and delivery of a deed imports a consideration, and it is not denied in the bill that an adequate consideration was paid, and that it was the full value of the land so conveyed. The fact that a deed is void does not, in and of itself, and apart from all other considerations, relieve those seeking to have it set aside from offering to do equity. This is a sound principle, and is based upon equity and good conscience.

The question here is raised by the demurrer to the bill, as well as by motion to dismiss for want of equity, in that the bill fails to make offer of restoration of the purchase money paid. The general rule that a void deed, alone and of itself, does not relieve a party seeking to have the same removed as a cloud upon title from offering to do equity by making restoration, finds support in the following of our own cases. Grider v. American F. L. M. Co., 99 Ala. 281, 12 So. 775, 42 Am. St. Rep. 58; George v. New Eng. Mort. Security Co., 109 Ala. 548, 20 So. 331; Interstate B. & L. Ass'n v. Agricola, 124 Ala. 474, 27 So. 247; Hayes v. Home B. & L. Ass'n, 124 Ala. 663, 26 So. 527, 82 Am. St. Rep. 216; ...