Jones v. Willie Jones' Ex'r

• Decision Date: 31 December 1805
• Citation: 5 N.C. 96
• Parties: MARY JONES v. WILLIE JONES' EXECUTOR.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

5 N.C. 96

MARY JONES

v.WILLIE JONES' EXECUTOR.

COURT OF CONFERENCE OF NORTH CAROLINA

DECEMBER TERM, 1805.

From Halifax.

A widow dissents from her husband's will, and claims a distributive share of the crops growing on lands devised. She files a bill in equity against the executor for an account of the crops and a distribution of them, but charges no fraud, etc. Bill dismissed on the ground that a court of equity has no original jurisdiction over the case. Widow's remedy is prescribed by the act of 1791, ch. 22.

WILLIE JONES, being seized and possessed of large real and personal estates, made his last will and testament, and therein devised all his lands to his two sons in severalty, some tracts to the one and some tracts to the other, and in a subsequent, separate and distinct clause, devised the crop, either growing or in the granaries, together with all the residue of his personal property, to be divided between his said two sons when the eldest arrived at age. He appointed Allen Jones executor of his will,

who after his death proved the same and undertook the execution thereof. Mary Jones, the widow, dissented from the will and claimed a distributive share of- the crops growing on the lands of her husband at the time of his death. The executor resisted the claim upon the ground that the crops passed with the lands on which they were growing to the two sons under the devises in the will. The widow filed a bill in equity for an account and distribution of the crops, and the case was sent to this Court for the opinion of the judges.

BY THE COURT. If the widow's claim to a distributive share of the crops growing on the lands of her husband at the time of his death be well founded (upon which point we shall give no opinion), she must seek to enforce it in the way pointed out by the act of 1791, ch. 22. A court of equity cannot exercise any original jurisdiction over the claim which she sets up. There is no charge of fraud in the executor, nor such matter of account as will authorize the Court to take cognizanceof the case. The bill must therefore be dismissed.