Alden v. Rector of St. Peter's Parish

• Decision Date: 01 November 1895
• Citation: 42 N.E. 392,158 Ill. 631
• Parties: ALDEN et al. v. RECTOR OF ST. PETER'S PARISH.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

158 Ill. 631

42 N.E. 392

ALDEN et al.

v.RECTOR OF ST. PETER'S PARISH.¹

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Nov. 1, 1895.

Appeal from circuit court, Kane county; Henry B. Wills, Judge.

Bill by Philander M. Alden and James M. Banks, executors of James S. Waterman, deceased, against St. Peter's Parish, in the City of Sycamore and Diocese of Illinois, otherwise known as the ‘Rector, Churchwardens, and Vestrymen of St. Peter's Parish, in the City of Sycamore and Diocese of Illinois,’ and others. Defendants obtained a decree. Complainants appeal. Affirmed.Carnes & Dunton and W. R. Plum, for appellants.

Botsford & Wayne, for appellees.

Appellants filed their bill in equity in the circuit court of Dekalb county at the October term, 1888, to set aside two certain deeds, and for partition of the real estate purporting to be conveyed by said deeds. A change of venue was taken to the circuit court of Kane county, where a hearing was had, and the bill dismissed for want of equity. The bill represents that on or about September 10, 1877, James S. Waterman, late of said Dekalb county, was the owner in fee simple of the following described real estate: Lots 9, 10, 11, and 12 in J. S. & J. C. Waterman's subdivision of lots 1, 2, 3, and 4 of block 24 of the original village of Sycamore in said Dekalb county, containing 29/100 acres of land; that on that day said James S. Waterman and Abbie L. Waterman, his then wife, now also deceased, made and delivered to the Rector, Churchwardens, and Vestrymen of St. Peter's Parish, in the City of Sycamore and Diocese of Illinois, otherwise known as ‘St. Peter's Parish in the City of Sycamore and Diocese of Illinois,’ a deed of conveyance of said lots; that on the 11th day of December, 1877, said grantors also executed a deed of conveyance of a farm in said Dekalb county, containing 160 acres of land, to said grantee, the express condition in each being ‘the love and affection’ grantors have and bear unto the Protestant Episcopal Church and said parish. The deed of the town lots contains the following exception and reservation: ‘Excepting and reserving therefrom, during the lifetime of the grantors herein and the survivor of them, the rents, profits, and income of the two dwelling houses situated on said lots, and such suitable quantity of land immediately about them as may be necessary to the proper enjoyment of the same, with the right to improve and repair said houses, but not to remove or destroy them; said premises to be used for church purposes only, and not sold or incumbered, and shall revert to the grantors, their heirs and assigns, whenever this condition is broken.’ And the deed of the farm contained a condition and reservation in the following words: ‘This conveyance is made upon the express condition and trust that the rents, issues, and profits of the above-described land be devoted to and used for the payment, so far as it may go, of the salary of the rectors of said parish, forever, and for no other purpose; and this conveyance is accepted upon the express understanding and agreement that the title hereby conveyed shall immediately revert to and be vested in the party of the first part, his heirs, executors, and administrators, when the income from said land shall be diverted to any other purpose. Excepting and reserving therefrom, during the lifetime of the grantors herein and the survivor of them, the rents, profits, and use of the above-described lands.’ James S. Waterman died July 19, 1883, leaving a will under which appellants were appointed, and are still acting as, testamentary trustees. He left also a widow surviving, who died before this bill was filed, and her representatives and devisees are now parties defendant. The bill proceeds on the theory that said conveyances were and are absolutely void, because contrary to the laws of the state of Illinois in relation to the creation of perpetuities, and because the grantee, as a religious society could not, under the statute, take more than 10 acres of land. And it is alleged that, by reason of the premises, Waterman, at the time of his death, still remained and was owner of all of said lands; that the said Abbie L. Waterman, widow of the said James S. Waterman, renounced under said will the provision therein made in her favor, and, there being no issue of the said James S. Waterman, the said widow elected to take one-half of all the real estate, and that she thereby became, and was at the time of her death, the owner of an undivided one-half of all of said real estate; that, under and by virtue of the terms of said will, complainants became the holders of the legal title of an undivided one-half of all of said land in trust for the uses and purposes mentioned in said will. The bill further alleges that the said St. Peter's Parish is, and was at the time of the execution and delivery of the said deeds of conveyance, a corporation formed for religious purposes under the laws of the state of Illinois for the incorporation of religious societies, and that under such laws the quantity of land mentioned and described in the deed of conveyance secondly above referred to could not, at the time of the executionand delivery of said deed, be owned or held by said St. Peter's Parish, nor could the grantees in said deed take or hold the lands therein attmepted to be conveyed for the purposes therein mentioned, and that for this reason, also, said last-mentioned deed was and is utterly void. The answer denied the allegation that St. Peter's Parish is, and was at the time of the execution of said deed, a corporation formed for religious purposes under the laws of the state of Illinois for the incorporation of religious societies. And, on its becoming known that the allegation in the bill as to the incorporation of the church could not be made clear by the proofs, the complainants filed an amendment to the bill in the following words: ‘Your orators further represent that it is claimed and pretended by the said St. Peter's Parish that it was never incorporated as herein charged, but your orators charge that the contrary thereof is the fact, as herein shown. Your orators charge, however, and insist that if in fact it should appear, on the hearing hereof, said St. Peter's Parish was not an incorporated organization, as herein stated, nevertheless it was at and long before the times of the delivery of the said deeds, and has been continually ever since, a church organization, formed and subsisting for religious purposes only, and to promote and advance the peculiar tenets of the religious sect known throughout Illinois as the ‘Protestant Episcopal Church,’ and belonging to the diocese aforesaid from and about the time of organization, to wit, 1856, and differed from other churches of this state, members of said diocese, only in the lack of such corporate entity.'‘And in virtue and effect, and to all intents and purposes, was precisely the same as if it had been duly incorporated, excepting only the legal, technical fact that it had not complied with the statute of the state of Illinois in filing its certificate of organization with the recorder of said Dekalb county, and therefore is and was within the statute of this state, and the policy of its laws, prohibiting religious corporations from owning and holding lands in excess of a stated amount; or it should be held, under the law, incapable of taking or holding title to any real estate whatever.’ This paragraph was demurred to, and the demurrer sustained, leaving the cause to go to a hearing on the rest of the bill. The bill further alleged that the condition contained in said first-mentioned deed has been broken, because the lands described have been used fo other than church purposes, and that, if any title ever passed by said deed, such title has, by...