Stringfellow v. Sorrells
| Decision Date | 17 November 1891 |
| Citation | 18 S.W. 689 |
| Parties | STRINGFELLOW v. SORRELLS |
| Court | Texas Supreme Court |
Tallcot & Turner and J. F. Jones, for appellant.
Before and at the time of her marriage to W. J. Sorrells in the year 1884 the appellee, Mrs. C. V. Sorrells, owned in her own right, together with other separate property, two mules. These animals were then colts, and worth $35 each; and a portion of their present value, as a result of their growth and avoirdupois as the years rolled on, is the subject of this controversy. The appellant, in the year 1888, held a just debt, merged into a valid judgment, for a small sum against the husband of the appellee, and in satisfaction of which he caused a writ of execution to be levied upon these mules of the wife during that year. At the time of the levy the animals were grown, and each of them worth in the market $75, instead of $35, as originally. The husband had managed and cared for the mules since the marriage, and the community estate furnished the provender for the animals during the intermediate time. The appellee replevied the property, and duly made her claim thereto under the statute, "to try the rights of property." The case came up to the district court from a justice court, and the former court rendered a judgment in favor of the wife. The appellant insists that the enhanced value of the mules, which has resulted from the attention of the husband and the food furnished by the community since the marriage, and amounts to $80, is an increase of the separate estate of the wife, and consequently is community property, and liable to his execution. There is a modicum of plausibility in his contention, based upon the construction given by the supreme court to "the increase of the lands" of the wife, but these decisions were inspired by the necessity of protecting, not of destroying, her estate. De Blane v. Lynch, 23 Tex. 25; Forbes v. Dunham, 24 Tex. 611; White v. Lynch, 26 Tex. 195; Cleveland v. Cole, 65 Tex. 402; Epperson v. Jones, Id. 425; Braden v. Gose, 57 Tex. 37; Carr v. Tucker, 42 Tex. 336. The supreme court has often decided what is not "the increase of the wife's lands," but, so far as we are aware, have not decided what is; and we are not required to do so now. The rule contended for would be most impracticable in application. The equitable criterion, if any were admissible in cases like the present, should be the expenses to the husband or the community, regarded as an investment of rearing the mules, not the increased value, which may be due to other causes, subject to be offset by the value of their use if anything. This would add to "confusion worse...
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