108 Ga. 618 | Ga. | 1899
This case turns upon the legal proposition announced in theheadnote. His honor, the trial judge, entertained a view contrary to what is therein laid down. The question involved is not an open one in this State. In Ellis v. Smith, 10 Ga. 253, this court held that: “A purchaser at sheriff’s sale, who has his deed first recorded, will gain the same preference over an unrecorded deed as if he had bought directly from the debtor himself.” The doctrine there announced was, in Tucker v. Harris, 13 Ga. 1, applied to the case of a purchaser at administrator’s sale, and it was held that, as he placed his deed on record, it was entitled to preference over an unrecorded deed to another, executed by the intestate in his lifetime. This decision was based upon the theory that the purchaser at the administrator’s sale stood .in as good a position as if he had bought from the intestate himself
The registry act of 1889 has no application to the present case. In Donovan v. Simmons, 96 Ga. 346, Judge Hart, speaking of this act in connection with deeds of bargain and sale, remarked : “ The law as to deeds of this character is unchanged by it. The danger of a failure to record a deed is the exposure of it to defeat by a subsequent vendee without notice of the prior purchase.” The case just cited was relied on by counsel for the defendant in error; but it is to be noted that the distinction between it and the case in 10th Ga. is precisely that which is pointed out in the above extract from the 20 Am. & Eng. Enc. L., viz., that while a judgment creditor is not protected by a recording act, a purchaser at an execution sale does come within its protection.
Judgment reversed.