Sumner v. Sawtelle

• Decision Date: 01 January 1863
• Citation: 8 Minn. 272
• Parties: AUSTIN SUMNER et al. vs. N. H. SAWTELLE et al.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

8 Minn. 272

AUSTIN SUMNER et al. vs. N. H. SAWTELLE et al.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Error to district court, Ramsey County.

This was an action to subject certain real estate to the claims of the creditors of the defendant Sawtelle. The pleadings showed that plaintiff had a judgment against him and another, and that he was insolvent; that Sawtelle's wife held a bond for a deed of the land, and Sawtelle, having performed other considerations, which were accepted by the obligor in lieu of the payment of the money mentioned by the bond, said obligor, at the request

of Sawtelle and wife, conveyed to the defendant, Mrs. Strout, who paid no part of the consideration; and that Sawtelle, with his family, occupied the premises as a homestead. The answer alleges that the transaction was in good faith, and not for the intent to hinder, delay, or defraud the plaintiff, or other creditors of Sawtelle, but states no other facts to remove the presumption of fraud as to creditors.

The court below, upon a trial, gave judgment in favor of defendants.

Points and authorities for plaintiffs in error: —

1. The object of the action is to charge the premises in question with the judgment of the plaintiffs in error, and if the facts of the case entitle us to this relief, the court will grant it, for the defendants have answered and the court may therefore grant any relief consistent with the case made by the complaint and embraced within the issue. Pub. Stat. 554, § 169; Van Santv. Eq. Pr. 108; Marquat v. Marquat, 12 N. Y. 336. When an answer has been put in, "the demand of relief in the complaint becomes immaterial." 2 Kernan, 341. The specific mode of charging the premises with the judgment may not be properly indicated in the prayer of the complaint, where we have asked that the premises be sold on execution as the property of N. H. Sawtelle, but this in no wise prevents us from taking a decree of sale, the remedy pointed out in Garfield v. Hatmaker, 15 N. Y. 478. The general prayer, for such other or further relief as to the court may seem meet, is not inserted in the complaint, and is rendered wholly unnecessary by the code, for if there be no answer, the relief cannot exceed that which shall have been specifically asked in the complaint. Pub. Stat. 554, § 169. The mere insertion of the general prayer could not change this statutory rule. If, however, the defendants have answered, as in this case, then the demand for relief becomes wholly immaterial, and the only question is, to what relief do the facts in the case entitle the plaintiffs.

2. By force of the statute no estate of any kind vests in Sawtelle after the conveyance by Mathews to defendant Strout, but the whole estate is in Mrs. Strout, subject to the plaintiffs' equities as creditors. Pub. Stat. 382, §§ 5, 7, and 8; 15 N. Y. 475; 22 N. Y. 564; 2 Minn. [283]. It will be observed that our statute is identical with that of New York, and hence New York decisions are in point.

3. The statute raises a trust in Mrs. Strout, in favor of the plaintiffs. See cases cited under 2d point.

4. A resulting trust to creditors being established, it must be enforced for their benefit unless the homestead exemption claim of Sawtelle intervenes to prevent it. We have already shown that the creditors are not pursuing Sawtelle's interest in the property, but the interest of Mrs. Strout. The debtor's own property, or his interest in property, (where he has not the whole estate) may be exempt, but it needs no argument to show that the exemption law applies to that only which but for the law would be liable to levy and sale on coercive process. Now, in the absence of any exemption law, will it be pretended that the estate which the law has vested absolutely in Mrs. Strout would be liable to coercive process against Sawtelle, or any person except Mrs. Strout? Nothing saves it from being absolutely her property and liable for her debts, except the claims of Sawtelle's creditors, whose equities are superior to her rights. It is not Sawtelle's resulting or beneficial interest that we would reach by this proceeding, as the opposing counsel seems to suppose, for he has none. Sawtelle then needs no protection, and has nothing that requires the protection of the exemption act, and no exemption claim that he may interpose can prevent the enforcement of this trust with which the law charges Mrs. Strout. Nothing in the statutes interferes with this common sense view of exemption acts. The Homestead Exemption Act, Pub. Stat. 569, § 1, provides that a "homestead," etc., defining it, "owned and occupied" by any resident of this state, shall not be subject to levy and sale, etc. Sec 6 of the same act provides that "any person owning and occupying any house or land, not his own, and claiming said house as a homestead, shall be entitled to the exemption aforesaid." How can a man own what is not his own? is the first question suggested by section six. To give it any effect it means only that the property which one has in premises occupied, etc., shall be exempt, though he may not have the full title; as, for instance, a leasehold estate. He must own as well as occupy something before any exemption attaches. In this case the statute gives the whole to Mrs. Strout, — then what is there for Sawtelle to own? Can A. be prevented from enforcing his judgment against land of B. by a third party in possession of the land without any title — a mere tenant at will, and who can at any moment be ejected by B., merely because the third party has a present residence and claims the same as a homestead? Can he say this is my homestead, and therefore you cannot have B.'s interest in the property? A. would certainly reply you are a tenant at will on B.'s land, and you will become a tenant at will on mine as soon as the levy and sale is consummated. Your homestead exemption attaches to your interest and not to B.'s, and it is B.'s interest, and not yours, that I am pursuing. I shall take B.'s title and not yours, for you have none, and then suffer you to remain as B. has done, on the premises, or eject you, as I see proper.

Finally, the court must find that Mrs. Strout has no interest in the land, or else it must allow us to sell it; for if she has any interest, Sawtelle having furnished the consideration money with which she took it, we are certainly entitled to have it applied on our claim. The counsel for the defendants in error seems to think it important that, somewhere in the complaint, we aver as a conclusion of law, that after the conveyance to Mrs. Strout there was a beneficial interest in Sawtelle — that thereby Sawtelle became the beneficial owner. We merely say in reply to this, that the attorney who drew the complaint was mistaken taken in his conclusion; that the facts alleged in the complaint did not warrant it. Again we say that the answer denies all the allegations in the complaint, except as therein admitted and stated, and then proceeds to admit certain facts about plaintiffs' judgment, the insolvency of defendants, etc., and then sets out the very facts pertaining to the premises on which we rely. We do not in the reply deny any of these facts except the homestead claim, and that issue was found for defendants. We rest our case, then, and claim our relief upon admitted facts that are not, and never have been (except as to the homestead), controverted, and upon the law arising upon these facts the court will determine what are our rights, and administer our relief. The question is, what is the real law upon the facts in the case, and not what did either party suppose the law to be when they framed their pleadings.

Points and authorities for defendants in error: —

1. The statute (sec. 8 of ch. 32, on page 382, of the Public Statutes) raises no trust in Mrs. Strout, in favor of plaintiffs in error, for the following reasons: First, the trust in favor of creditors arises only when a fraudulent intent exists. The fraudulent intent is a necessary condition to such a trust being raised. Second, the consideration having been paid by Sawtelle, the statute above cited makes the conveyance to Mrs. Strout only prima facie fraudulent, and throws the burden of proof on the defendants. Third, the facts found by the court below fully and conclusively rebut the presumption of fraud, and show conclusively that there was not, and could not be, any fraudulent intent, inasmuch as the court below finds that the bond for a deed of the lot was taken to Mrs. Sawtelle, for the purpose of making it a homestead for Sawtelle and family; that it was immediately built upon and occupied for that purpose, and that Sawtelle and wife have ever since held and occupied the same as and for their family homestead, and that it was, in fact, their homestead. The court below also expressly finds there was no fraud. The complaint charges fraud, the answer denies it, and the court finds all the matters in the pleadings, not found in the decision, untrue. Fourth, the reason why a conveyance without consideration is fraudulent as to creditors, is because it is an attempt to place property beyond their reach, which otherwise might be resorted to, to pay their debt. Adams Eq. [148]; Willard Eq. Jur. 237; Story Eq. Jur. § 366, et seq. It is held, as appears by the above authorities, that an assignment of choses in action without consideration, is not fraudulent as against creditors, where they cannot be reached by an execution. This doctrine applies with infinitely greater force when the property is especially exempt from execution by law, for reasons of public utility. If Sawtelle had taken the deed to himself, instead of Mrs. Strout, he could have held the lot against all creditors. The conveyance to Mrs. Strout, in trust for him, placed the creditors in no better or worse position. The motive for the act is immaterial. The act itself is innocent, and no one is defrauded, because no one is injured. Fifth, the statute above cited does not...