Emmert v. Stouffer
| Decision Date | 31 October 1885 |
| Citation | 6 A. 177,64 Md. 543 |
| Parties | EMMERT v. STOUFFER and another. |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
ALVEY, C. J. I concur in the reversal of the decree appealed from in this case, but not in the reasons assigned for such reversal. As I understand the opinion, it asserts that the action of the orphans' court, in declaring against the validity of the paper purporting to be the will of Mrs. Stouffer, was simply void, because the paper had not in fact been propounded for probate by the parties producing it. In other words, because the parties producing the paper had not asked the court to admit it to probate as a valid will, therefore the order of the court rejecting the paper, and granting letters of administration, was wholly without effect upon the paper as a will; the court, as supposed, having assumed jurisdiction in the premises without warrant of law. This ground for declaring the proceeding simply void and without effect, it strikes me, has too much of the appearance of a technical refinement to be altogether sound; and I do not think it has proper foundation in fact. The paper was certainly propounded for the action of the court.
The two sons named as executors in the paper exhibited were the only children and heirs at law of the deceased, and they were made devisees and legatees for life, with remainder to their children. They produced the paper purporting to be the will of their mother to the orphans' court, and submitted the same to the judgment of that tribunal, as they were bound to do under the law; but in their petition they repudiated the nomination of themselves as executors, and submitted the paper, with a disclaimer on their part that they offered it for probate, for the reason, as they alleged, that the deceased was incapable, for want of mental capacity, to make a valid will,—thus accompanying the exhibition of the paper with a caveat against its admission to probate. In the same petition they prayed to have letters of administration granted to them upon the estate. Upon this petition the orphans' court passed an order fixing a day for hearing and inquiring "into the matters and things set forth in said petition," and gave directions for summoning the witnesses to the paper exhibited, and such other witnesses as the petitioners might desire. On the' day set the hearing was had upon the testimony of witnesses produced at the instance of the petitioners; and the court, upon hearing the evidence, then and there passed the order of the fourth of February. 1885, whereby it is recited that the court having heard the testimony of witnesses "concerning the paper purporting to be the last will and testament of the said Eliza Stouffer, and the court being satisfied that at the time the said paper was executed by her she was not capable of making a valid deed or contract, and that the said paper writing is not her last will and testament," thereupon it was adjudged, ordered, and decreed by the court that the said Eliza Stouffer died intestate, and that letters of administration upon her estate be granted to Daniel B. Stouffer.
Now, with such a state of proceedings as this disclosed by the record before us, it is rather difficult, I think, to say that the paper was not before the orphans' court, and that the sons and heirs at law of the deceased did not invoke and obtain the judgment of that court against the validity of the paper as a will, and so procured probate to be refused. The court was one of competent jurisdiction, and the subject-matter was plainly within the jurisdiction; and, though the proceeding may not have been formal and regular, still there was a judgment evoked that binds and concludes the parties to the proceeding. Those parties could never be heard to contend, in the face of the proceedings had at their instance, that the paper should ever thereafter be admitted to probate. The judgment of the orphans' court, therefore, is not a mere nullity, and without any effect upon the validity of the paper. It was necessary to adjudicate the paper invalid as a will, and to refuse probate thereof, before the orphans' court could proceed to declare, as it did, that the deceased had died intestate, and to grant letters of administration as upon an intestate's estate. Both the orphans' court, and the parties invoking its action, clearly understood that the paper exhibited had been finally refused admission to probate.
But the question here is whether the refusal of probate to this paper, under the circumstances of the case, will finally bind and conclude the parties entitled in remainder; those parties being...
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... ... C. A.) ... 210 F. 754, Ann. Cas. 1916A, 940; Jarvis v. Heiner (C. C ... A.) 39 F. (2d) 361; Wood v. Grundy, 3 Har. & J ... 13; Emmert v. Stouffer, 64 Md. 543, 551, 3 A. 293, 6 ... A. 177; Brown v. Smart, 69 Md. 320, 331, 14 A. 468, ... 17 A. 1101; Stocksdale v. Jones, 133 Md. 176, ... ...
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Shafer v. Children's Hospital Soc. of Los Angeles, Cal.
...be binding in an adversary proceeding for probate begun under § 19-301, D.C.Code (1951). Emmert v. Stouffer, 1886, 64 Md. 543, 3 A. 293, 6 A. 177. If in the latter proceeding the will is adjudged valid and is admitted to probate, the letters of administration previously issued are revoked. ......
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