Steele v. Taylor

• Decision Date: 01 January 1852
• Citation: 1 Minn. 274
• Parties: FRANKLIN STEELE vs. ARNOLD W. TAYLOR.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

1 Minn. 274

FRANKLIN STEELE vs. ARNOLD W. TAYLOR.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Appeal from order of district court, Ramsey county.

Points and authorities for appellants:

1. The said order appealed from was improperly granted, for the reason that all the grounds on which it was asked were untrue and insufficient.

2. The evident object for which said order was asked, and the only effect it would have, was to carry out and consummate a collusion and conspiracy between said Steele and Taylor to deprive these appellants of their equitable rights.

3. The said orders of the 14th, 18th and 24th days of March, 1853, were taken by default and consent, and therefore were not properly vacated, without the assent of both parties.

4. The respondent herein had notice not only of the application to the court for the said orders, but also of the particular form of the application, and having suffered the said orders to be taken by default, could not afterwards properly object to them in mere matter of form, even though the form was irregular.

5. The proper form for application for the said orders, was a matter resting in the sound discretion of the court; and that discretion having been once exercised, could not properly be reviewed.

6. In matter of form the said application to the court by petition was regular, precedented, and in accordance with the well settled principles of equity practice.

7. The said petitioners, the appellants in this court, had an interest in the real property or money which was the subject of litigation in this cause.

8. That interest a court of chancery would be bound to recognize and protect, whenever it should be brought by proper application within its judicial knowledge.

9. The applications to the court below were necessary, and in matter of substance, if not in matter of form, properly made; and the said orders of court were just and equitable to all the parties concerned, and were therefore properly made and ought not to have been vacated.

10. If any order were admissible in the instance of the one appealed from, it should have been at most a modification of the former orders, and that without prejudice to the rights of the petitioners.

11. The order of court appealed from to this court is irregular, unprecedented, unjust, and inequitable, and therefore ought to be reversed.

12. Justice under the law and rules of chancery proceedings, requires of this court that the interests of these appellants in this cause shall be protected.

In support of which said points, the said appellants will cite the following authorities, to wit: 3 Paige, R. 573; 4 id. 476-8; 7 id. 290; 3 Johns. R. 543; 10 id. 521; 1 Barb. Ch. Pr. 597; id. 595 and 596; 1 Moulton's Ch. Pr. 32; 2 id. 77; 2 Ves. R. 113; 13 id. 394; Story's Eq. Pl. 342; id. 541; 1 Story's Eq. Ju. § 496; 2 id. 742; 16 S. & Rawl. R. 237; 11 Wend. R. 448; 4 J. J. Marsh, R. 395; Daniel Ch. Pr. 1201; Adams Eq. 312; id. 316; id. 713; Rev. Stat. Minn. Ter. ch. 94. § 76; 1 Barb. Ch. Pr. 33, 578, 633; 3 Paige, R. 123, 166, 446, 476; 4 id. 289, 378; 7 id. 288, 364, 513.

Points and authorities for respondent:

The record of the bond from Taylor to Steele gave to Steele a title, according to the terms of the bond, and was by express statutory provision, notice to, and took precedence of, any subsequent purchaser or purchasers, and operated as a lien upon the lands described in the instrument, according to its import and meaning. § 3, Rev. Stat. 215. The district court has decided that Steele fulfilled sufficiently the terms of the bond, so far as he was concerned. MS. opinion of Judge Fuller overruling motion to dissolve injunction in this case. The assumption of the contracts, payment for the stove, and the payment of Bantin were to be done after Taylor had given the deed. Id.

To a bill for specific performance, the parties to the contract are the only proper parties. Wood v. White, 4 Mylne, & Craig, 460; Taskee v. Small, id.; 3 Paige, R. 63; Hall v. Deva, 3 Y. & C. Eq. Exc. 191; Dan. Ch. Pr. 247; ______ v. Walford, 4 Russ. 372; Melthorpe v. Holegate, 1 Collyer, 303, and cases there cited. If a person pendente lite acquires a voluntary interest in the subject matter of the suit, he cannot, by petition, pray to be admitted to take a part as a party defendant. Dan. Ch. Pr. 328; Story's Eq. Pl. S. 342, note; Foster v. Deacon, 6 Madd. R. [59;] 2 Mitf. Eq. Pl. by Jeremy, 68; Sedgwick v. Cleveland, 7 Paige, R. 290; Deas v. Thorne, 3 Johns. R. 544; Gaskill v. Durdin, 2 Ball & B. R. 167; Murray v. Lylburn, 2 Johns. Ch. R. 443; Hoxie v. Carr, 1 Sumner, 173; 1 Smith Ch. Pr. 432; Mitford's Pl. note on Parties, 397, 398 and ref. Bishop of Manchester v. Bean, 3 Ves. R. 316; Metcalf v. Pulvertoft, 2 Ves. & B. 205-7 and ref. Final orders ought not to be granted upon petition. 1 Smith's Ch. Pr. 70. A party in contempt cannot be heard upon petition. 1 Smith's Ch. Pr. 72. This court has no jurisdiction of this appeal. Rev. Stat. 471, § 74.

North & Secomb, for appellant.

Hollinshead & Becker, and H. J. Horn, for respondent.

CHATFIELD, J.

The bill in this case was filed by the complainant against the defendant Arnold W. Taylor, to enforce the specific performance of the condition of a bond executed by Taylor to the complainant; such bond being conditioned (among other things) for the conveyance to complainant by Taylor of certain real property therein described. The defendant Taylor answered the bill, contesting the complainant's equitable title to the property, and his right to have such specific performance. Pending these proceedings between the complainant and Taylor, certain other parties obtained judgment against Taylor, and, by virtue of executions issued thereon, caused parcels of the same real property claimed by the complainant under his bill, to be sold by the proper sheriff. After such sales by the sheriff, the purchasers, or those claiming under them, made their petitions, and thereon asked to be admitted and made parties defendant in the suit between the complainant and Taylor, and for relief. Notices of such applications were served on the solicitors for the complainant, but there was no appearance on the part of the complainant at the hearing of either of them. The applications were granted. Subsequently, the complainant, upon affidavit and notice, moved to vacate the orders admitting the petitioners as parties defendant, and upon that motion an order was made vacating the orders made upon the said petitions, and dismissing the petitions. From that order the appeal in this case was taken.

The main question to be determined upon this appeal rests upon the character of the position in which the appellants (the petitioners) stand relative to the complainant and Taylor. It is this: are the appellants to be deemed voluntary purchasers pendente lite, of the several parcels of the lands in question which they respectively claim in their petitions, or are they to be considered as persons receiving the title thereto pendente lite by operation of law? If they are voluntary purchasers, they may, or may not be made parties, at the election of the complainant. They cannot, as such, be allowed to come in as parties against, or without his consent, and whether parties or not, they would be bound by the decree. If they have, under their purchases, any interests or equities requiring protection against the effect or consequences of a decree between the original parties they must seek it, not by petition to be made parties in the pending suit, without the consent of the complainant, but by the original bill in the nature of a supplemental and cross bill. Story's Eq. Pl. § 342; 7 Paige, Ch. R. 288. If they are persons upon whom the title has been, by operation of law, cast pendente lite, they must be made parties, and the complaint cannot proceed until they shall have been brought in as such.

They claim title by execution. It is a kind of title unknown to the common law, and seems to be of American origin. It has grown out of the system of judgment liens adopted by many, and probably by most of the American states, and out of the enforcement of the purposes of such liens, by process of execution. The lien of the judgment and process of execution, appear to have been substituted for the old common law writ of elegit. 4 Kent's Com. 423 441, 497.

The lien is one that is forced and fixed upon the estate by operation of law, and is converted into an absolute title by virtue of the process of execution and the action of the proper officer. The title is thus transferred from the judgment debtor to the purchaser, without regard to the will or desire of such debtor. So far, it is a conveyance of the title by operation of law, for the proceedings and process of the law are made the instruments by which, and the conduits through which, the title is made to pass from the judgment debtor to the purchaser. The presumption is, that the judgment debtor is thus involuntarily divested of his title. But the purchaser takes voluntarily. His purchase is wholly an act of volition on his part, and he receives and holds in his own right, and not in trust for the use of others, all the estate that he obtains by his purchase. He acts for himself wholly in making his bids and purchase, and is influenced and governed by his judgment of what, under the circumstances, his own interests, and not those of others, require or render advisable. He cannot be deemed other than a voluntary purchaser, though he receives his title by operation of law. The lis pendens is notice to him, and he takes the title cum onere, precisely as he would by a bona fide voluntary conveyance from the judgment debtor, and his position with reference to both of the original parties to the suit, is the same as it would be under such voluntary conveyance. It seems to me that it would be inconsistent and incompatible with other well-established principles, to allow him, for the protection of his own private interests,...