Moore v. Stemmons

• Decision Date: 18 June 1906
• Citation: 95 S.W. 313,119 Mo. App. 162
• Parties: MOORE v. STEMMONS et al.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

95 S.W. 313

119 Mo. App. 162

MOORE v. STEMMONS et al.

Kansas City Court of Appeals. Missouri.

June 18, 1906.

ASSOCIATIONS—ACTIONS AGAINST PARTIES.

A valid judgment enforceable by execution against the property of an unincorporated association cannot be obtained in an action at law against the trustees of the property of the association.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Jasper County; J. D. Perkins, Judge.

Action by Robert Moore against John Stemmons and others. From an order overruling a motion to quash an execution issued on a judgment for plaintiff, defendants appeal. Transferred from Supreme Court (90 S. W. 434). Reversed.

Shannon & Shannon, for appellants. C. W. Bigger, for respondent.

BROADDUS, P. J.

This is an appeal from the action of the court in overruling a motion to quash an execution.

Appellants are trustees of the Methodist Epispocal Church (colored) of Carthage, Mo. Respondent in an action at law recovered judgment against the appellants on a promissory note executed by their predecessors in office. It is alleged in the petition that the said church was an association for religious purposes and that the property of the association was vested in, held, and controlled by a board of trustees, and that its business and financial affairs were transacted by said board of trustees, and the promissory note in suit was executed by the members of the board of trustees on behalf of the church in consideration of a debt due by the association to the respondent, and by virtue of their authority as such trustees, and that appellants herein were the successors of the trustees who executed the note. Judgment was rendered against the appellants in their representative capacity as such trustees, and it contained a direction for satisfaction out of the property of the association. Upon this judgment respondent caused an execution to be issued against appellants, in their representative capacity as trustees of the church only, to be satisfied out of the property of the Methodist Episcopal Church (colored) of Carthage, Mo. The return of the officer upon the execution shows that it was levied upon all the right, title, interest, and claim of title of John Stemmons, Geo. Patterson, and Henry Tidwell, trustees of said church in Carthage, Mo., in their representative capacity as trustees of said church only, of, in, and to certain described real estate (describing it). The title of a part of the property seized was conveyed to the predecessors of appellants, "as trustees of the Wesley Chapel, M. E. Church of Carthage, Mo.," as follows: "In trust that said premises shall be used, kept, and maintained and disposed of as a place of divine worship for the use of the ministry and membership of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States of America." The title to the remainder was conveyed to the trustees of the "Methodist Episcopal Church, Carthage, Jasper county, Mo.," in trust for the same purpose as that of the other part described.

The motion to quash the execution was based upon the following grounds: "(1) Because the judgment upon which the same was issued is void. (2) Because the...