In re Snelling's Will

• Decision Date: 17 January 1893
• Citation: 136 N.Y. 515,32 N.E. 1006
• Parties: In re SNELLING'S WILL.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

136 N.Y. 515

32 N.E. 1006

In re SNELLING'S WILL.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Jan. 17, 1893.

Appeal from supreme court, general term, second department.

Application for the probate of the will of Mary Snelling, deceased. Probate was contested by Mary Gorden and others, on the ground, among others, of incapacity of testatrix to execute a will by reason of advanced age, impaired faculties, and undue influence. From a judgment of the general term (17 N. Y. Supp. 683) affirming a decree of the surrogate's court admitting the will to probate, contestants appeal. Reversed.

L. R. Beckley, for appellants.

Thomas Young, for respondents.

O'BRIEN, J.

The will of Mary Snelling, who died in the year 1890, was admitted to probate, after a contest before the surrogate, which was instituted by her nephews and nieces, her only next of kin, on the ground of incapacity and undue influence. She was about 84 years of age, and possessed of a small personal estate, which she bequeathed to the persons, husband and wife, with whom she lived at the time of the execution of the will, which was but a few months before her death. The property came to her from her husband, who died in 1885. Subsequent to his death she lived with various persons in the neighorhood as a boarder, and during this time it appears that she made several other wills in favor of parties with whom she lived or boarded for short periods of time. Her management of the property, and the frequent change of purpose on her part in disposing of it by will, from time to time, in favor of different persons with whom she temporarily resided, and to whom she was more or less attached for the time, would seem to indicate that she had no fixed plan with reference to her estate, and possessed no great intelligence in business affairs. Still it was not shown conclusively that she lacked the capacity necessary in a person of her age and condition in life to dispose of her property by will, or that the will in question was the the result of undue influence. The fact that the deceased was a woman of advanced age, somewhat enfeebled in body and mind, and that she gave her property to strangers, instead of her collateral relatives, from motives of gratitude or personal attachment, does not show that she was wanting in intelligence sufficient to comprehend the condition of her property and the scope and effect of the testamentary provisions. So long as her mental powers enabled her to understand and appreciate the amount and condition of her property, and to comprehend the nature and consequences of her act in executing the will, she was at liberty to dispose of her own in such manner as seemed best to her, providing the disposition was her own free act. What the law terms ‘undue influence’ is not established by proof tending to show that the testator acted from motives of affection or gratitude, though the objects of her bounty were strangers to her blood. The influence or moral coercion, or by whatever other term designated, must be such as to overpower the will of the testator, and subject it to the will and control of another, in which case it assumes the character of fraud. Horn v. Pullman, 72 N. Y. 276;Clapp v. Fullerton, 34 N. Y. 190;Hollis v. Theological Seminary, 95 N. Y. 166;Marx v. McGlynn, 88 N. Y. 370.

The evidence given upon the trial before the surrogate, viewed in the most favorable light for the contestants, was conflicting; and the findings that the deceased was possessed of sufficient capacity to make a will, and that the will was not the result of undue influence, are conclusive upon us with respect to the objections made against its probate. But the record discloses certain rulings by the surrogate in the course of the proceedings before him which, in view of the nature of the questions involved in the trial, cannot be overlooked. On the hearing two witnesses were produced by the contestants for the purpose of sustaining the objections made to the probate of the will, who testified at great length to various acts, conversations, and transactions of the testatrix, tending to establish undue influence and incapacity. This testimony extended over some years prior to the execution of the will, and much of it had no bearing upon the issues, as may well be inferred from the fact that it covers over 50 printed pages in the record. The proponents then called...