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12 Tex. 175

Morris v. Runnells

Texas Supreme Court

Decided July 1, 1854

Texas Supreme Court · decided 1854-07-01

Error from Rusk. The appellee sued the appellant in Rusk ■County, that being the county of the defendant’s residence, for the rescission of an executed contract for the sale of six hundred and forty acres of land in Fannin county, on the ground that the sale was procured by fraud. The petition was indorsed with notice that the action was brought to try the title, &c. It seems that the action was brought under the 6th exception of Article 667.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1854-07-01

How this case has been cited

Cited by 12 later decisions — most recently April 1957

2 federal appellate · 10 state decisions

3018541860187018801890190019101920193019401950decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Wheeler, J.

¶1It is insisted for the plaintiff in error, that the Court had not jurisdiction to try the case in the county of the residence of the defendant, because the land, the subject matter of the sale which it was proposed to rescind, was situated in a different county.

¶2There was no objection taken to the jurisdiction of the Court, by plea or exception. And we have heretofore decided, that the right of the defendant to be sued in a particular county, being a question of local jurisdiction merely, is a personal privilege, which the defendant, if he think proper, may waive ; and which, by pleading to the action without objecting to the jurisdiction, he will be deemed to have waived. (11 Tex. R.) Besides, the present is not properly an action for the “ recovery of land, or damages thereto.” It is a suit, the primary object of which, and the object attained, was the rescission of a contract. Land, it is true, was the subject matter of the contract. But there can be no more reason for requiring the suit to be brought in the county where the property was situated, in this case, than in a case where the object of the suit is the rescission of a contract relating to any other species of property. The case does not come within the language, or apparent intention of the statute. (Hart. Dig. Art. 667.) And the objection, if taken in proper time, ought not to have prevailed.

¶3The defendant, by expressly admitting in his answer the giving of the receipt in question, dispensed with the necessity of proof by the plaintiff of that fact; and took upon himself *178the burden of proof as to the purpose for which he alleged it-to have been delivered to the plaintiff.

¶4It does not appear what was the character of the protest spoken of. The receipt was not commercial paper, and was not the subject of a notarial protest for non-acceptance, evidenced by the act of the notary. Bnt the record is evidently incomplete in not containing the protest and deposition referred to, and properly constituting a part of the statement of facts. Every presumption is in favor of the judgment". And in the absence of the protest and deposition in question, it would not be unreasonable to suppose that, taken in connection, they may have, afforded competent evidence of the due presentation and non-payment of the receipt.

¶5But it will suffice to dispose of the objection to the ruling of the Court admitting the evidence in question, that it was rendered immaterial by the other evidence in the case. The admission of the defendant that the receipt was worthless, dispensed with the necessity of proving its presentation and nonacceptance or non-payment, which would have been but evidence of the admitted fact. But the admission made out the case for the plaintiff on this point, independently of the evidence objected to. The plaintiff was entitled to a verdict without it. Its admission, therefore, can have operated no injury to the defendant, and cannot afford a ground for reversing the judgment. The judgment is therefore affirmed.

¶6Judgment affirmed.

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