Ratliff v. Ratliff

Decision Date02 December 1902
CourtNorth Carolina Supreme Court
PartiesRATLIFF et al. v. RATLIFF et al.

42 S.E. 887
131 N.C. 425

RATLIFF et al.
v.
RATLIFF et al.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

Dec. 2, 1902.


ISSUES SUBMITTED — DEEDS — CONTRACTS — RECORDS — PROBATE — DECLARATIONS—EXCEPTIONS—HANDWRITING—EVIDENCE.

1. The issues submitted to the jury are sufficient, where every ground of contention can be presented by appropriate evidence on them.

2. By express provision of Code, § 1251, the registry or record of a deed or other instrument required or allowed to be registered or recorded is admissible as proof of it, unless by a rule of court on affidavit the party entitled to possession of the original shall have been previously required to produce the original.

3. The registry of an agreement is admissible as proof of it, though it does not appear from the registration that there was any revenue stamp on it.

4. The parties and subscribing witnesses to an instrument being dead, testimony of one that he was well acquainted with the handwriting of the subscribing witness, and had had numerous business dealings with him, and that, to his best knowledge and belief, the signature was in his true handwriting, satisfies Code, § 1246 (10), providing that in case of probate of an instrument required or allowed to be registered, having a subscribing witness who is dead, satisfactory proof of his handwriting, or that of the maker, when there is no subscribing witness, is sufficient proof to allow registration.

5. Declarations of a grantee in possession of land that he had received it under an agreement to hold it for his life, it then to go to certain others, and that he paid nothing for it, and had declined to sell it because of this trust, are admissible against him and one claiming through a voluntary deed from him.

¶ 5. See Evidence, vol. 20, Cent. Dig. §§ 824, 825. 842.

6. Exception to refusal of nonsuit at close of plaintiff's evidence is waived by defendant thereafter introducing evidence.

7. A deed having been pleaded in the complaint and admitted in the answer, and the registration admitted in evidence without suggestion of incorrectness therein, or rule of court to produce the original, the original is properly rejected as irrelevant.

8. An original deed being irrelevant, the deed having been pleaded in the complaint and admitted in the answer, and its registration admitted in evidence, and plaintiffs refusing to admit that the signature of the witness on it was genuine, it is not admissible, that defendants may compare with it the signature of the witness as witness to an agreement, which plaintiffs claim is a forgery; and defendants cannot have the deed admitted for such purpose by evidence that the probate ordering it to registration was in the handwriting of one formerly judge of probate.

9. In a suit by deceased's children by his first wife against his children by his second wife to recover laud conveyed by him, without consideration, to defendants, —plaintiffs' contention being that it was conveyed to deceased in trust to hold for life, and then for plaintiffs, —evidence offered by defendants that after deceased's death all his realty, except this and one small tract, was allotted to his wife as dower, and deeds expressed on their face to be in consideration of love and affection, executed by deceased and wife to defendants, are irrelevant.

10. A witness may testify to a certain signature being that of the person it purported to be, though he was not acquainted with the person's handwriting till four years after the signature was made; the weight of his testimony being for the jury.

11. Declarations of one in his own favor, tending to show he had a fee-simple title to land, are inadmissible, though declarations of his to the contrary had been admitted.

12. Testimony of witness that he had made statements to others of the same matters testified to by him on the trial was competent to corroborate him.

Appeal from superior court, Anson county; McNeill, Judge.

Action by W. U. Ratliff and others against J. H. Ratliff and others. Judgment for plaintiffs, and defendants appeal. Reversed.

H. H. McLendon, for appellants.

J. A. Lockhart, Robinson & Caudle, and Bennett & Bennett, for appellees.

CLARK, J. There is no valid objection to the issues, as every ground of contention could be presented by appropriate evidence upon the...

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