Gottstein v. Hedges
Decision Date | 13 December 1929 |
Docket Number | 39616 |
Citation | 228 N.W. 93,210 Iowa 272 |
Parties | FRANK GOTTSTEIN, Appellant, v. EDA HEDGES et al., Appellees |
Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
REHEARING DENIED APRIL 16, 1930.
Appeal from Cass District Court.--H. J. MANTZ, Judge.
Creditor's suit to subject to payment of judgments against defendant Eda Hedges an annual interest charge imposed in her favor by a deed from her father, Peter Hopley, to her brother, Wayland A. Hopley. Decree for defendants. Plaintiff appeals.
Affirmed.
Parrish & Huston and E. M. Willard, for appellant.
L. R Forsyth and Swan, Martin & Martin, for appellees.
STEVENS, J., not participating. DE GRAFF, J., dissents.
The facts are stipulated. Under date of January 14, 1922, Peter Hopley signed and acknowledged a deed to defendant Wayland A. Hopley of a tract of land, The deed was "delivered * * * to James G. Whitley to be held by him in escrow and to be delivered by the said James G. Whitley to the said Wayland A. Hopley upon the death of the said Peter Hopley * * * said deed was delivered by said James G. Whitley to said Wayland A. Hopley shortly after the death of Peter Hopley [which occurred March 9, 1926], who accepted said deed." The deed was recorded May 22, 1926.
Before the date of the deed, two judgments, and after its date (but in grantor's lifetime), a third judgment, were recovered by plaintiff against Eda (May) Hedges and Clarence Hedges in large amounts. Eda Hedges was insolvent for more than five years prior to the trial in May, 1928. Wayland A. Hopley on May 26, 1926, purchased another judgment against Eda Hedges. The stipulation is:
"That the said Wayland Hopley claimed the right to retain the sum of $ 1,250 per annum until said judgment was satisfied; that said Wayland Hopley was notified on the ninth day of February, 1928, by Eda Hedges delivering to him a certain document of her intention not to accept the annuities created in her behalf by said deed * * * that this renunciation * * * is the first notice that Wayland Hopley had from his sister Eda Hedges in reference to her intention regarding said annuity, and that he never paid her any sum or sums under said annuity * * *; that the said Eda Hedges had never assigned or taken any act in relation to said annuity * * *; that, in his capacity as trustee, if such capacity now exists, he [Wayland Hopley] has received no sum or sums of money under the provisions of said deed, either as annuity or principal."
Eda Hedges, on February 9, 1928, executed an instrument by which she did "finally renounce and reject any and all benefits, interest, gifts and annuities which do, may or might accrue to" her under the deed in question, "and all provisions of said deed * * * whether the same merely constitute a contract obligation in my behalf or as the beneficiary of a trust, either actual, constructive, resultant or implied." Original notice in the present suit, accompanied by copy of the petition, was served on Wayland A. Hopley and Eda Hedges July 7 and 9, 1926.
Plaintiff's argument is:
The provision made in the deed in favor of the judgment debtor was, as to her, a gift. We need not pause to discuss the question of who would take the gift in the event of renunciation by the donee. A gift, however created, whether by will or inter vivos, is wholly inoperative unless accepted by the donee. Cases post; 28 Corpus Juris 643. A creditor of the donee has no such interest, legal or equitable, as to enable him to control the right of the donee to refuse acceptance or renounce the gift. Funk v. Grulke, 204 Iowa 314, 213 N.W. 608; Schoonover v. Osborne, 193 Iowa 474, 187 N.W. 20; Robertson v. Schard, 142 Iowa 500, 119 N.W. 529; Piekenbrock & Sons v. Knoer, 136 Iowa 534, 540, 114 N.W. 200; In re Estate of Stone, 132 Iowa 136, 109 N.W. 455. While acceptance of a gift which is beneficial to the donee and which imposes no burden upon him may be presumed ( Kneeland v. Cowperthwaite, 138 Iowa 193, 115 N.W. 1026; In re Estate of Bell, 150 Iowa 725, 130 N.W. 798; 28 Corpus Juris 672), the presumption prevails only in the absence of evidence of renunciation. Mahoney v. Martin, 72 Kan. 406 (83 P. 982). The donee may, notwithstanding the presumption, renounce the gift, and thereby non-acceptance is proved. Gray v. Nelson, 77 Iowa 63, 41 N.W. 566, and cases above cited. The gift in the present case would, in view of the judgments against the donee, be of at least doubtful benefit to her. There might be various reasons (whether morally good or bad is legally immaterial), why she should prefer that its benefits go to her brothers and sisters, or other heirs of her father, rather than to her creditors. It is not argued that the delay in renouncing is such as to be evidence of acceptance. The record does not set out the original answer in this suit of the judgment debtor. By her substituted answer she pleads the renunciation. The renunciation is fully established. The grantee in the deed, while by its acceptance he bound himself to pay the $ 25,000 and the interest to whoever would, under the law, be entitled to it, could not, by his agreement to pay it, bind the judgment debtor to an acceptance of the obligation as one to pay her, or bind her to acceptance of it as a gift to her.--Affirmed.
STEVENS, J., not participating.
DISSENT BY: DE GRAFF
I respectfully dissent to the pronouncement made by the majority as to the interpretation of the facts and the law as applied to the facts. This is an action in the nature of a creditor's bill. The plaintiff was the judgment creditor of the defendant Eda Hedges, and when he commenced his equitable action, in conformity to Section 11815 et seq., Code of 1927, he thereby "effectually secured by the filing of a bill in chancery" an equitable lien "for it has long been the settled doctrine in equity that the filing of such a bill in chancery has the effect of creating a specific equitable lien upon the thing or property sought to be subjected to the execution, for the reason perhaps, that the commencement of such a suit operates as a lis pendens notice, and stops all successful alienation of the property in question, and keeps it within the control and jurisdiction of the court." Bridgman & Co. v. McKissick, 15 Iowa...
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