Seeley v. Phi Sigma Delta House Corp.

• Decision Date: 04 December 1928
• Docket Number: No. 8.,8.
• Citation: 222 N.W. 180,245 Mich. 252
• Parties: SEELEY et al. v. PHI SIGMA DELTA HOUSE CORPORATION et al.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

245 Mich. 252

222 N.W. 180

SEELEY et al.

v.PHI SIGMA DELTA HOUSE CORPORATION et al.

No. 8.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

Dec. 4, 1928.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Washtenaw County, in Chancery; George W. Sample, Judge.

Suit by Roy R. Seeley and another against the Phi Sigma Delta House Corporation and others. Decree for plaintiffs, and defendants appeal. Affirmed.

Argued before the Entire Bench.David I. Hubar, of Detroit (Harold B. Desenberg, of Detroit, of counsel), for appellant Phi Sigma Delta House Corporation.

Bonisteel & Lane, of Ann Arbor, for appellants Menefee and Lloyd.

Stivers & Laird, of Ann Arbor, for appellees.

WIEST, J.

This is a building restriction case, and presents the question whether use of property, restricted by covenant running with the land to ‘one single private dwelling house,’ prohibits the erection and use of a college fraternity or chapter house.

Plaintiffs own and reside upon premises in a residential district in the city of Ann Arbor, restricted by deed, as above mentioned. Defendants Lloyd purchased premises adjoining plaintiffs', subjected by deed to the same restriction, and sold the premises to defendants Menefee on land contract, carrying the restriction, and the Menefees sold their contract interest to defendant Phi Sigma Delta House Corporation, subject to the restriction. Other neighboring property is restricted likewise. Defendants appealed from a decree enjoining construction of a fraternity house on the premises.

The language employed in stating the restriction is to be taken in its ordinary and generally understood or popular sense, and is not to be subjected to technical refinement, nor the words torn from their association and their separate meanings sought in a lexicon. The term as a connected whole was employed for a purpose, and if such purpose is manifest, and the words to accomplish it apt, we need only make application thereof to the facts established by the evidence. We here find the term employed for restrictive purposes in deeds, a land contract, and transfer thereof, and therefore it is a restrictive covenant running with the lands burdened and benefited thereby. We have before us, even as defendant corporation had before it in the very transfer under which it claims, a restriction couched in a few English words of common use and general understanding, and we must accord them their ordinary or popular sense in the accomplishment of the purpose the words as a term express. The restriction was imposed by an owner when he sold lots in a residential district, and the purpose was to preserve such character with its assurance of privacy and quiet enjoyment for the reciprocal benefit of all purchasers of lots.

Abstractedly stated, the words ‘dwelling house’ are of multiple meanings, 19 C. J. 843, but they assume concrete meaning, to accord with the sense in which they are employed, in particular instances. In building restriction cases, involving covenants, the term ‘private dwelling house’ means a building designed as a single dwelling to be used by one family. Schadt v. Brill, 173 Mich. 647, 139 N. W. 878,45 L. R. A. (N. S.) 726;Kingston v. Busch, 176 Mich. 566, 142 N. W. 754;De Galan v. Barak, 223 Mich. 378, 193 N. W. 812. Defe...