Parsons v. Mcknight

• Decision Date: 01 January 1875
• Citation: 43 Tex. 557
• Court: Texas Supreme Court
• Parties: GEORGIE PARSONS v. KEYS & MCKNIGHT.

43 Tex. 557

GEORGIE PARSONS

v.KEYS & MCKNIGHT.

Supreme Court of Texas.

1875.

APPEAL from Rusk. Tried below before the Hon. J. W. Pope, special judge.

Suit by Keys & McKnight, against Georgie Parsons, brought in 1871, for goods claimed in the petition to have been necessaries, sold and delivered to Mrs. Parsons in 1861-'62. She set up her minority at the time of the purchase as a defense, and alleged that she then had a guardian of her person and estate. The character of the guardianship is not disclosed by the evidence; nor does it appear that she was supplied with necessaries by any one. Counsel for defendant requested the court, in effect, to charge the jury, among other things, that the law presumed that the guardian had performed his duty, and had furnished his ward with necessaries, and that, in the absence of evidence on that point, they should find for defendant. The refusal of the court to give this charge was assigned as error.

The verdict rendered for plaintiffs was for a less sum than that claimed. Judgment accordingly, from which defendant appealed.

Martin Casey, for appellant.

N. G. Bagley, for appellees.

IRELAND, ASSOCIATE JUSTICE.

This suit was brought by appellees to recover on an account for goods sold to appellant while she was single and a minor.

There is a plea of minority, of payment, and that she had a guardian at the time the account was made. The proof shows that she had a guardian, but whether of her estate or person does not appear. It is also shown by the evidence that she was about fifteen years of age when she got the goods; that she had a mother living, and that appellees knew she was a minor. It does not appear whether the guardian or mother either proposed to supply her needs, or that they refused to do so.

It is alleged that the articles purchased were necessaries and suitable to the rank and station of appellant.

The account sued on, amounting to $121, was clearly proven, and defendant says in her deposition that she remembers purchasing some of them, but does not in her testimony deny any portion of the account; she also says, “I think those I purchased were suitable for me as a member of society.”

It is very clearly settled that a minor may be held responsible for necessaries. (40 Tex., 32.)

Tyler on Infancy and Coverture, p. 99, chap. 7, says: “It is clearly agreed by all the books and authorities that the contract of an infant for necessaries is neither void nor voidable.” He cites 1 Parsons on Contracts, 244.

If a minor be living with the father, and is supplied by the father, he cannot be made liable. And it has been held that an inquiry into that fact was not a condition precedent to the right of recovery. (Tyler, p. 102, citing Dalton v. Gib, 35, Eng. C. L. R., 49; Bradshaw v. Eaton, 7 Scott R., 183.)

From these last authorities it would appear...