Baker v. Ducker

Citations

• 79 Cal. 365
• 21 P. 764
• 1889 Cal. LEXIS 735

Syllabus

<p>Corporation—Religious Society—Reformed Church of Stockton— Fraudulent Change of Denomination — Action by Members — Pleading. —In an action to recover for the use of members of the First Reformed Church of the City of Stockton a lot of land with the dwelling-house thereon, which was purchased and formerly used as a parsonage of the church, a complaint stating in substance that the plaintiffs and their associates, for whose benefit the action is also prosecuted, are a religious society in full membership with a national religious society known „as the Reformed Church in the United States; that they were organized for the purpose of teaching the gospel according to the particular tenets of that church, as embodied in the Heidelberg Catechism, and were duly incorporated, under the name of the First Reformed Church of the City of Stockton; that the said corporation purchased the property with donated funds for a residence for its pastors, and for no other purpose; and that the defendants had fraudulently conspired to change the name of said corporation to that of the First German Evangelical Lutheran Zion Society of Stockton, for the purpose of repudiating the tenets of said Reformed Church, and of diverting the property from the use to which it was dedicated, for the support of the Lutheran Church, which has a different doctrine, different church government, and different laws from those of the Reformed Church, and that defendants are now holding and using the same, as trustees of said Lutheran Church, as a residence for the pastors of said Lutheran Church, — states a cause of action, and is not indefinite and uncertain in not stating particularly wherein the doctrinal standards of the two churches differ.</p> <p>Id. —Parties — Suing for Benefit of Many. —The complaint in such action averring that plaintiffs, together with a large number of other persons, are associated together for religious purposes, and are members of the First Reformed Church of the City of Stock