117 Ga. 537 | Ga. | 1903
A distress warrant for rent was sued out by Mrs. Jennie B. Garrison against J. M. Parker, who filed a counter-affidavit. The issue thus formed was tried in the superior court of Houston' county, without the intervention of a jury, upon the following agreed statement of facts: In,1897, V. A. Garrison made a deed to Cecil Morgan, covering certain lands in the 10th district of Houston county, to secure the payment of a debt due by the former to the latter. Garrison died during the following year. The
In the case of Blitch v. Lee, reported in 115 Ga. 112, this court ruled that: “A purchaser at an execution sale of land which has been rented by the defendant in execution [to a third person], though the contract of rental was made subsequently to the date of the judgment upon which the execution was founded, acquires the title of the owner in the land, but only the interest of such owner in the growing crop thereon. And where the owner, undep the contract of rent, has only the right to collect a stated sum as rent for the year, the purchaser has a right to collect this amount from the tenant, but has no further claim against him and no other interest in the crops of the year than may be necessary to secure the payment of the amount due by the tenant as rent under the contract with the owner.” In support of this ruling, the cases of Dollar v. Roddenbery, 97 Ga. 148, and Hancock v. Boggus, 111 Ga. 885, were cited approvingly. The opinion filed in the former was delivered by Mr. Justice Atkinson, who said (pp. 149-150): “ A judgment in this State operates only as a lien upon the prop
Counsel for the plaintiff in error sought to distinguish the case now before us from those above cited, on the ground that it appeared in the present case that the judgment in favor of Morgan was rendered subsequently to the date of the contract of rental between the plaintiff and the defendant. Our reply is, that the legal title to the land was at that date in Morgan, who held it as security for the payment of a demand against the estate represented by the plaintiff. In her representative capacity she had possession of the land; but her right to its use and occupation was subject to be defeated at any time by an enforcement of Morgan’s lien thereon, and her tenant could acquire through her no better right
In a brief filed in behalf of the plaintiff in error, counsel suggests that as “most landlords live on their rent contracts during the year, and rent contracts and notes are used as collateral by the landlords for their own use,” if it be held, in a case such as the present, that the legal effect of “ a sale of the lands, either judicially or by the landlord, is to terminate the tenancy, then the value of these papers will be greatly impaired.” This argument is not entitled to much weight. Landlords who are not in a position to fulfill their obligations to their tenants can not reasonably expect “ to live on their rent contracts during the year,” and persons extending credit to landlords on the faith of such contracts can not reasonably expect tenants to pay rental for land in the possession of which their landlords fail to keep them. In other words, contracts of this nature have the incidents which attach to all other instruments which are not negotiable.
Judgment affirmed.