Parker v. Conrad

• Decision Date: 09 June 1906
• Docket Number: 14,629
• Citation: Parker v. Conrad, 74 Kan. 111, 85 P. 810 (Kan. 1906)
• Parties: ANN AMELIA PARKER v. EMILY E. CONRAD
• Court: Kansas Supreme Court

85 P. 810

74 Kan. 111

ANN AMELIA PARKER v. EMILY E. CONRAD

No. 14,629

Supreme Court of Kansas

June 9, 1906

Decided January, 1906.

Error from Saline district court; ROLLIN R. REES, judge.

Judgment affirmed.

SYLLABUS

SYLLABUS BY THE COURT.

1. PETITION--Suit to Quiet Title--Allegation of Plaintiff's Title. A statement in a petition in a suit to quiet title that the plaintiff is the owner in "fee simple," and is in actual possession, sets forth the plaintiff's title with sufficient certainty.

2. PETITION--Discovery of Defendant's Claim of Title. In such a suit, if it is alleged that the defendant asserts an interest or estate in the lands adverse to the plaintiff, and that the plaintiff does not know the nature or character of such interest or estate, he may have discovery, and the defendant is thereupon required to plead the facts upon which such interest or estate is based.

Terry Parker, for plaintiff in error.

C. W. Burch, for defendant in error.

GREENE J. All the Justices concurring.

OPINION

GREENE, J.

This was a suit to quiet title. The petition states that plaintiff is the owner in fee simple and is in the actual possession of the property, describing it, and that "the defendant claims an estate or interest in said real estate adverse to the plaintiff, the exact nature of which is unknown to plaintiff and for that reason cannot be set forth herein, but plaintiff alleges that any such claim, estate or interest of the defendant is invalid as against plaintiff." The petition then asks that defendant be required to set up her claim to the premises, and for a judgment determining such interest to be inferior to that of plaintiff, decreeing plaintiff to be the owner in fee simple, and canceling the defendant's claim. To this petition the defendant demurred. The demurrer was overruled, and, the defendant choosing to plead no further, the cause was tried by the court and judgment rendered for plaintiff in accordance with the prayer of the petition.

The defendant now complains that the court erred in overruling her demurrer, (1) because the petition does not state with sufficient certainty plaintiff's title to the land in controversy, and (2) because it does not state with sufficient certainty the exact nature and extent of the defendant's pretended title or claim of title. The argument is that if this were done the court would be enabled to determine from the petition whether the defendant's claim did in law cast such a cloud upon plaintiff's title as would justify the interference of a court of equity.

The petition states that the plaintiff is in actual possession and is the owner in "fee simple." "Fee simple" and "fee simple absolute" are equivalent terms, and well defined legal expressions. An estate in "fee simple" is the greatest that one can possess. When the pleader says that the plaintiff is the owner in "fee...