STATEMENT OF FACTS.
Emma Parrish
brought this suit in equity against Willie Parrish and others to reform a deed
to real estate in Fort Smith, Ark.According to the
allegations of the complaint, on the llth day of November, 1919, Alice Taylor
Callahan, by a quitclaim deed conveyed the two lots in controversy to Joseph E.
Parrish and Emma Parrish for the consideration of $1600, $250 of which was paid
in cash, and the balance was evidenced by promissory notes executed by Joseph
E. and Emma Parrish, who were husband and wife at the time the deed was
executed.
Before the delivery of said deed, it was discovered that it did not
correctly describe the property intended to be conveyed, and on the 19th day of
November, 1919, Alice Taylor Callahan executed a new deed to the property
intended to be described, to Joseph E. Parrish for the purpose of correcting
the misdescription in the first deed. Upon the delivery of the last deed the
plantiff was assured that the mistake had been corrected, and she did not
examine the deed and discover that her name as one of the grantors had been
erroneously omitted therefrom until after the death of her husband.
For some time prior
to the purchase of the property, the plaintiff and her said husband occupied
the same, and plaintiff had conducted thereon a grocery store which was her
individual business. The cash payment was made out of her earnings and profits
in conducting the grocery store. It was the intention of plaintiff and her
husband that the title to said property be vested in them as tenants by the
entirety.
The prayer of the complaint is for a reformation of the deed by the insertion
of the plaintiff's name therein as one of the grantees in said deed and as one
of the purchasers of the property.
According to the allegations of the answer, Willie Parrish is the son of
Joseph E. Parrish and Emma Parrish.
Joseph E. Parrish died on the 8th day of
December, 1920, leaving Willie Parrish and Earl Parrish, his sons and sole
heirs at law. They deny that Alice Taylor Callahan intended to convey the
property in question to their mother and father as husband and wife in such
manner as to create an estate by the entirety. They admit, however, the
execution of the deed as set out in plaintiff's complaint. They admit that the
description of the property was incorrect as described in the first mentioned
deed.
The plaintiff filed
a demurrer to the answer, which was sustained by the court.
The defendants
declined to plead further, and a decree was entered in favor of the plaintiff.
The defendants have appealed.James B.
McDonough, for appellant; Davis & AsKby of Chillicothe, Mo.,
of counsel.
The married
woman's act of 1919 destroyed estates by entirety.
2. The deed to
Joseph and Emma Parrish, if they were .unmarried, would create a tenancy in
common, and not an estate by the entirety. 124 Ark. 167.
The deed was to
Joseph and Emma Parrish, but not to them as husband and wife.
George F. Youmans, for appellee.
(Judge) Hart, J., (after stating the facts). According to the allegations of the
complaint, which are to be taken as true upon demurrer, Joseph E. Parrish
and Emma Parrish were husband and wife when the first deed to the property in
question was executed to them, and it was the intention to convey them an
estate by the entirety. A mistake was made in the description of the property
which was corrected by a new deed executed to Joseph E. Parrish alone. It was
represented to Emma Parrish that the new deed was to her husband and herself as
in the first instance, and she did not know any difference until after the
death of her husband.
It is the
contention of counsel for the defendants that our Married Women's Acts have
abolished estate by the entirety, and several cases from the Supreme Courts of
other States are cited in support of their contention.......
Counsel for the defendants urge us to overrule this case in this respect; but,
as we have already seen, the
holding is in
accord with our previous decisions bearing on the question, and we adhere to
it.