Atchison v. Francis
| Decision Date | 18 December 1917 |
| Docket Number | No. 30211.,30211. |
| Citation | 182 Iowa 37,165 N.W. 587 |
| Parties | ATCHISON ET AL. v. FRANCIS ET AL. |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from District Court, Mahaska County; K. E. Willcockson, Judge.
Action in equity to quiet title. By his answer the defendant C. B. Patterson sets up a claim of title to an undivided part of the property. A demurrer to his answer was sustained and decree rendered as asked by the plaintiff. Defendant Patterson appeals. Reversed and remanded.John T. Clarkson, of Albia, for appellant.
Irving C. Johnson, C. H. Mantuel, and W. R. Lacey, all of Oskaloosa, for appellees.
[1] The question presented is wholly one of law, and its decision turns upon the construction to be given to the will of John W. Atchison, deceased. By the terms of this instrument Elizabeth Atchison, the widow, was given a life estate in all the real property left by the testator. In a subsequent paragraph is found the following language:
The testator died in the year 1901 and the widow in 1913. The testator was survived by all his three daughters named in the will, but one of them, Mary L. Patterson, died intestate in 1912, or about one year before the death of the life tenant. Mrs. Patterson was survived by her husband, C. B. Patterson, who is the appellant in this case.
Stated briefly, the question is whether, these facts being conceded, appellant, as the surviving husband of Mary L. Patterson, acquired or succeeded to any right or interest in the property of which John W. Atchison died seised. It is the claim of the appellees that the will provides for no remainder over, either vested or contingent, and that no title or interest of any kind was vested by the will in any of the children until the time arrived for the sale and distribution of the estate after the death of the widow, and that as Mary L. Patterson died before that time arrivedshe never acquired or had any interest therein. On the other hand it is appellant's theory that the will does provide for a remainder over and vests the same in testator's three named daughters of whom Mary L. Patterson was one; that her rights as such beneficiary became fixed and vested at once upon the death of John W. Atchison, and that upon her dying intestate appellant acquired a surviving husband's statutory share in her property, including this which she derived through the will of her father.
The theory of appellee's counsel that the will creates no remainder over is manifestly quite untenable. It is conceded, and indeed must be, that the will does provide a life estate, and in the very nature of things when this particular estate was created the title or fee, less the particular estate, must have been left in somebody. If the will did not dispose of it, then it would remain in the form of a reversion in the heirs of the deceased, who would inherit it as intestate property wholly independent of the will. But it is perfectly apparent that the will, after creating the life estate, does provide in specific and unambiguous terms for the disposition of all the rest of his property, real and personal, and this constitutes the creation and disposition of a “remainder” whether the will designates it by that or some other name. That the owner of the fee may by will create a life estate in the property without a reversion in himself or his heirs, and without a remainder over in any one, is a legal impossibility. The testator in this case did not attempt any such feat. He gave his wife a life estate and, subject only to the payment of his debts and the payment of a small legacy, he gave the remainder over to his three daughters, not as a class but as three specifically named individuals. True, he did not in express words use the term “give” or “devise” but (what was equivalent thereto) he directed a sale of the property and a division of the proceeds to the daughters in equal shares, suspending such division for such time only as was necessary to let in the life estate of the widow. There is not a word or phrase in the will, or a circumstance connected therewith, suggestive of the thought that the postponement was intended to work a suspension of the daughters' right and interest in the property, or was provided for any other purpose than to withhold possession and enjoyment thereof until the widow's life estate should expire.
There is a class of cases in which legacies given to be divided and paid at a future day to persons named or to a designated class of persons who shall then be living, or where by the terms of the will such restriction is fairly to be implied, no right vests under such gifts until the appointed time arrives, and the remainder in such cases will be regarded contingent. But where the postponment is made merely to let in a life estate or serve the convenience of the estate in any other respect, and there is no restriction of the devise in favor of survivors or of persons or classes to be determined in futuro, then the postponement affects not the vesting of the legatee's right to the gift, but only the right of its present delivery or enjoyment.
[2][3] Before citing a few of the almost countless precedents which establish and illustrate this rule it is well to recall a few of the elementary principles which govern the construction of gifts of this character. The law always favors the vesting of estates, and if the construction of the devise is open to any doubt upon the question whether the remainder is vested or contingent, the former will prevail and the latter will be rejected. Kellett v. Shepherd, 139 Ill. 443, 28 N. E. 751, 34 N. E. 254; Schouler on Wills (2d Ed.) § 563; Archer v. Jacobs, 125 Iowa, 467, 101 N. W. 195;Putbrees v. James, 162 Iowa, 618, 144 N. W. 607;Ross v. Ayrhart, 138 Iowa, 121, 115 N. W. 906. It is equally well settled that where a devise of a remainder or other right or interest in property is accompanied by words of survivorship in the event of the devisee's death, they will be construed to have reference to the death of such devisee before the will becomes effective by the death of the testator, unless the language of the instrument clearly reveals a different intent. Collins v. Collins, 116 Iowa, 703, 88 N. W. 1097;Callison v. Morris, 123 Iowa, 297, 98 N. W. 780;Tarbell v. Smith, 125 Iowa, 389, 101 N. W. 118;Haviland v. Haviland, 130 Iowa, 611, 105 N. W. 354, 5 L. R. A. (N. S.) 281;Lingo v. Smith, 174 Iowa, 461, 156 N. W. 402.
Of the multitude of precedents bearing upon the construction of wills in which the testator first provides a life estate for his widow or other person and follows this by a direction that upon the expiration of such life estate the property shall be divided or shall be sold and the proceeds divided between certain named persons, or members of a designated class of persons, and holding such remainder to be vested, we will cite a few illustrative cases. If we first look to jurisdictions other than our own we find, with very few exceptions, a unanimous holding that in such cases the beneficiaries named acquire a vested right therein immediately upon the death of the testator. Johrden v. Pond, 126 Minn. 247, 148 N. W. 112;Rumsey v. Durham, 5 Ind. 71;Knight v. Pottgeiser, 176 Ill. 368, 52 N. E. 934;Scofield v. Olcott, 120 Ill. 362, 11 N. E. 351;Aldred v. Sylvester, 184 Ind. 542, 111 N. E. 914;McCauley's Estate (Pa.) 101 Atl. 827;Huber v. Donoghue, 49 N. J. Eq. 125, 23 Atl. 495;Grimmer v. Friederich, 164 Ill. 245, 45 N. E. 498;Heilman v. Heilman, 129 Ind. 59, 28 N. E. 310;McArthur v. Scott, 113 U. S. 340, 5 Sup. Ct. 652, 28 L. Ed. 1015; Rood on Wills, §§ 590, 591; Bryant v. Plummer, 111 Me. 511, 90 Atl. 171;Moulton v. Chapman, 108 Me. 417, 81 Atl. 1007;Cropley v. Cooper, 19 Wall. (86 U. S.) 167, 22 L. Ed. 109;Weller v. Kolb, 128 Md. 221, 97 Atl. 542; Gardner v. Gardner, 1 Ont. Rep. 184; Packham v. Gregory, 14 L. J. Ch. (N. S.) 191; Cogburn v. Ogleby, 18 Ga. 56; Hocker v. Gentry, 3 Metc. (Ky.) 463;Neel's Estate, 252 Pa. 394, 97 Atl. 502;Post v. Herbert, 27 N. J. Eq. 540;Vanhook v. Vanhook, 21 N. C. 589;Martin v. Cook, 129 Md. 195, 98 Atl. 489;McLaughlin v. Penney, 65 Kan. 523, 70 Pac. 341;Hoover v. Smith, 96 Md. 396, 54 Atl. 102;Cushman v. Arnold, 185 Mass. 165, 70 N. E. 43; Mill Co. v. Fisk, 47 Mich. 212;King v. King, 1 Watts & S. (Pa.) 205, 37 Am. Dec. 459; Collier's Will, 40 Mo. 287;Robert v. Corning, 89 N. Y. 225; 1 Jarman on Wills, 763; Beatty v. Montgomery, 21 N. J. Eq. 324;Perkins v. Collins, 3 N. J. Eq. 482. In the note to Shackley v. Homer in 55 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1049, the annotator, after citation of cases, states the rule as follows:
“If it appears that a future gift is postponed in order to let in some other interest, or, as it is sometimes expressed, ‘for the benefit of the estate,’ the gift is vested notwithstanding, although the enjoyment is postponed.”
In Scofield v. Olcott, 120 Ill. 374, 11 N. E. 351, the court in applying the rule held in effect that estates in remainder vest at the earliest period possible unless a contrary intention on the part of the testator is clearly shown. * * * Where it is a remainder after a life estate, it is regarded as a vested remainder, and the possession only is postponed.
The Pennsylvania court, considering a will which gave a life estate to the widow and thereafter to be divided among children, says:
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