Sanders v. Sorrell

• Decision Date: 12 March 1888
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: R. B. SANDERS v. J. W. SORRELL ET AL

3 So. 661

65 Miss. 288

R. B. SANDERS v. J. W. SORRELL ET AL

Supreme Court of Mississippi

March 12, 1888

APPEAL from the Chancery Court of Claiborne County.

HON WARREN COWAN, Chancellor, presiding by interchange with Hon Lauch McLaurin, who was of counsel in the case.

The case is stated in the opinion of the Court.

Decree reversed and bill dismissed.

Lauch McLaurin, for the appellant.

1. Was the administrator's sale valid? The presumptions of law are in favor of its validity.

The probate record of the administration is perfectly regular. It shows that the administrator's sale was legally ordered conducted, concluded and confirmed; that the purchase money was paid, and afterwards expended under the directions of the court, and that these orders and the entire administration with no indecent haste, and upon due notice, were approved by the allowance of the administrator's final account.

If then the sale was void, and no irregularities appear upon the probate record, the burden of proof, dehors this record, is upon appellees.

2. Appellant and his grantors were innocent purchasers, etc. Such purchasers are special favorites in courts of equity. See Boon v. Chiles, 10th Peters' U. S. Rep., 177.

3. The one year statute is a good defence; but it was error for the lower court to consider this defence only.

Lauch McLaurin argued the case orally.

J. Mc. C. Martin, on the same side.

Robert B. Sanders purchased over two years after sale made and confirmed. The bar of the statute had then fixed. He paid $ 1000 in good faith for said land. He made inquiries at the proper place respecting the title to said land, and found it regular and valid; and he is entitled to be protected in such purchase.

J. Mc. C. Martin also made an oral argument.

Stephen Thrasher, for the appellees, submitted the case upon an oral argument.

OPINION

COOPER, C. J.

This is a suit by the heirs at law of Green Sorrells to cancel certain conveyances by which the land of their father has been vested in the appellant. Green Sorrells died some time prior to the year 1866, and in that year administration upon his estate was granted by the proper court to one A. D. Jones as a creditor, the widow having declined to take administration. The administrator petitioned for and obtained an order for the sale of the lands of his intestate for the payment of debts, and in due time reported that a sale thereof had been made to one Tanksley at a price named; this report was approved by the court and the sale confirmed, and thereafter the administrator exhibited his final account, which was passed, and the administration closed. About one year after the administrator's sale, Tanksley conveyed a part of the land to one Baggett, and a part to J. J. Covington. Afterwards Covington conveyed the portion he had bought to Baggett, who, on the same day, conveyed the whole tract to the defendant Sanders, who has since that time been in possession thereof, having paid in full the purchase price.

The proceedings in administration are regular and valid, as they appear on record, and there is nothing found in them to cast any doubt upon the validity of the sale. The ground upon which the sale is attacked by the heirs at law is that Tanksley was a mere figure-head and that the sale was, in fact, made by Jones, administrator, to himself, which fact he concealed from the court by procuring Tanksley to appear as the purchaser. We think the evidence supports the allegation of the bill in this respect, and if this alone would entitle the complainants to a decree regardless of the character of Sanders as a bona fide purchaser, we would affirm the decree of the Chancellor. We will consider the case first in the light it was viewed by the Chancellor and then pass to other questions of fact not decided by him. The Chancellor delivered a written opinion, which is filed in the record, and disposed of the case on the ground that since Jones, the administrator, was the real purchaser at the sale, the heirs at law are entitled to a decree cancelling all the conveyances under which the defendant claims, even though he and Baggett and Covington may have been innocent purchasers.

This, we think, is an erroneous view of the rights of the parties, into which the Chancellor was probably led by the fact that the defendant relied upon a statute of limitations which we think has nothing to do with the controversy.

By Section 2173 of the Code of 1871 it was declared that, "No action shall be brought to recover any property heretofore sold by any administrator, executor or guardian, by virtue of the order of any probate court of this State, on the ground of the invalidity of such sale unless such action be commenced within one year after this chapter shall take effect, if such sale...