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142 Ala. 490

Randle v. Daughdrill

Supreme Court of Alabama

Decided November 15, 1904

Supreme Court of Alabama · decided 1904-11-15

<p> Bill in Equity to Determine Claims to Real Estate and to Quiet the Title thereto. </p> <p>1. Statutory till to quiet title; what possession necessary to maintain it. — To maintain a bill under the statute to compel determination of claims to real estate and to quiet title thereto, it. must be shown that complainant was in the peaceable possession of said property as contradistinguished from contested or disputed possession.</p> <p>2. Same; same; sufficiency of evidence. — In such cases where the evidence shows that the land in question was wild and uncultivated land; that the defendant claims under a deed; pays taxes thereon; has kept trespassers off said property, and has taken tan bark therefrom, it cannot be said that the plaim tiff is shown to have such peaceable possession as entitles him to relief.</p>

Relies on Adler v. Sullivan · Brand v. United States Car Co.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1904-11-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 25 later decisions — most recently April 2006 · most notably George E. Wood Lumber Co. v. Williams (1908), Webb v. Griffin (1942)

25 state decisions

7019041910192019301940195019601970198019902000decided

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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ANDERSON, J.

¶1The complainants filed their bill to quiet title to land, under sections 809 to- 814 of the Code of 1896.

¶2*492This court has repeatedly held that' in order to maintain the bill the proof must show a peaceable possession in the complainant as contradistinguished from a contested, disputed or scrambling possession. — Lynn v. Arndt, in MS.,; Brand v. M. S. C. Co., 128 Ala. 579; Adler v. Sullivan, 115 Ala. 582.

¶3While we do not wish to be understood as holding that respondents have a valid title under the tax sale or to decide in whom is reposed the possession of this land, we do' not think the possessory acts of respondents, as shown by the proof, were sufficient to show that complainants did not have the peaceable possession of the land.

¶4A decree pro confesso having* been rendered against respondents J. M. Randle, Lowe and Burnett and who do not assign error in this court, this appeal is affirmed as to them. Reversed as to Many E. Randle and a decree will be here rendered dismissing the bill as to her and the costs of the appeal are taxed against the complainants.

¶5Reversed and rendered.

McClellan, C. J., Tyson and Simpson, J. J., concurring.
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