Vaca Valley & Clear Lake Railroad v. Mansfield

Citations

• 84 Cal. 560
• 24 P. 145
• 1890 Cal. LEXIS 842

Syllabus

<p>Quieting Title — Proof of Defendant’s Claim — Admission of Answer — Nonsuit. — In an action to quiet title, a nonsuit should not be granted for failure of the plaintiff, after having proved title in himself, to prove an adverse claim, title, or interest in the defendants, when the complaint alleges and the answer admits that the defendants claim and assert an interest in the property.</p> <p>Id. — Waiver of Motion for Nonsuit — Curing Error.—If such proof were necessary on the part of plaintiff, an error in denying defendant’s motion for a nonsuit for want of it is cured by proof on the part of defendants of the adverse claim or interest in the property on which they relied to defeat the action.</p> <p>Id. — Evidence — Offer to Prove Non-occupation of Premises — Statute of Limitations — Pleading. — When the statute of limitations is not pleaded, and an offer is made hy defendants to prove merely that no one had occupied the premises in controversy for ten years prior to the commencement of the action, such evideuce cannot aid the defendants’ claim of title, and is properly excluded.</p> <p>Id. — Deed of Corporation — Corporate Seat. — Rebutting Prima Facie Evidence —Unauthorized Filling of Blank Deed. — Though the corporate seal attached to the deed of a corporation is prima fade evidence that it was placed there by proper authority, and that the deed was duly executed and delivered, yet such pdma fade evidence may he rebutted and overcome by proof that the deed when signed was a blank, as to the name of the grantee and the description < f premises, and that the directors and officers of the corporation never authorized or contemplated a sale of the premises therein described to any one; that the deed was never acknowledged; and that the blanks in the deed were tilled without authority from the corporation by its treasurer, to whom the blank deed was delivered by the president for the purpose of negotiating a sale of lots other than those described, and who inser