181 S.W.2d 1015 | Tex. App. | 1944
This appeal regularly proceeds from a judgment of a district court of Dallas County in pursuance of an instructed verdict. Appellant claimed to have been the common-law wife of Andrew Stevenson, deceased, at the time of his death — hence, as such, entitled to share in his estate; and, by virtue of being his surviving wife, he having died intestate without issue, and the property in suit having been acquired by him during their marriage, she inherited the whole of the property to the exclusion of appellees, sister of the deceased.
Against the action of the court below, in peremptorily instructing a verdict against her on the issue of whether or not she was the common-law wife of Andrew Stevenson, we are confronted with the rules in Texas that courts must indulge every legitimate conclusion reasonably inferable from the evidence in favor of the questions involved — disregarding all adverse evidence; that the sufficiency of the evidence to raise the issue is one of law, and its sufficiency to satisfy the jury is entirely for the jury. Rodriguez v. Texas Employers' Ins. Ass'n, Tex. Civ. App.
Since no particular character of evidence of marriage is required by the statutes of this State, a common-law marriage is good where there is evidence of an agreement between a man and a woman, both competent to marry, presently to become husband and wife, and who are actually living together as such in pursuance of such agreement, and holding out with each other to the public as husband and wife. Martinez v. Martinez, Tex. Civ. App.
In this instance, appellant being unable, on account of the interdiction of Article 3716, R.S. (dead-man's statute), to testify as to whether or not she made an agreement with deceased that they would become husband and wife, followed by cohabitation and holding out to the public their marriage state (Holman v. Holman, Tex. Civ. App.
Reversed and remanded.