Hazard v. Stevens
| Decision Date | 05 December 1913 |
| Parties | HAZARD v. STEVENS et al. |
| Court | Rhode Island Supreme Court |
Case Certified from Superior Court, Washington County.
Bill for the construction of a will by Thomas G. Hazard, trustee, against Hazard Stevens, executor, and others. Certified to the Supreme Court by the Superior Court for hearing and determination. Decree in accordance with the opinion.
Benjamin W. Case, of Wakefield, for complainant.
Archibald C. Matteson, of Providence, for respondents.
This is a bill in equity for the construction of the will of Mary Hazard, late of Newport, deceased, and for instructions to the complainant trustee of the trust fund of about $6,040 existing under it as to its final distribution.
It is stated that all persons who, under any construction of the will, might have any interest in said trust fund have been made parties, and it appears from the papers in the case that all of the defendants answered the bill, admitting its allegations to be true, and joining in its prayer, and submitting themselves and their rights and interest to the judgment of the court. The cause, under the provisions of chapter 289, § 35, Gen. Laws (1909), is certified to this court by the superior court from Washington county for hearing and determination.
An inspection of the whole will shows it to be a will solely of personal property. No real estate is mentioned or referred to in it, the language used is appropriate to personalty, and counsel informed the court at the hearing that the estate disposed of by the will consisted only of personal property, and that the trust fund now to be distributed consists solely of personal property.
The first seven bequests dispose of numerous specific articles of tangible personalty, and six of those bequests are to nieces of the testatrix, daughters of her deceased brother Benjamin Hazard, hereafter more specially referred to.
The eighth bequest is as follows:
The next paragraph constitutes these three unmarried nieces trustees of the fund from which the income is derived, and contains particular directions as to investment and reinvestment, directs them to keep the principal "whole and entire," etc. The complainant is the present trustee of the fund under this clause.
The next paragraph is as follows:
The next clause appoints these same three nieces executrices of the will, and the will concludes with the formal clauses of execution and publication.
The portions of the will above quoted in full are those upon which the questions submitted to the court arise. It is admitted by the pleadings that the will was executed January 5, 1846; that the testatrix died in 1852, and the will was duly probated in Newport, R. I., January 31, 1853; that Payton R. Hazard (mentioned in the above-quoted clause as my "nephew Payton") was a son of Benjamin Hazard, deceased, brother of the ladies mentioned in the same clause, and that he died April 9, 1849, in the lifetime of the testatrix, intestate, without issue, and unmarried; and that the other "nephew Daniel" in said clause mentioned was named Daniel L. Hazard, and was also a son of said Benjamin Hazard, deceased, and that he died May 19, 1911, leaving a will.
It is further admitted that Nancy Hazard, one of the three single nieces mentioned in the clause first above quoted, after the date of the will, married John Alfred Hazard, her cousin; that he died May 22, 1880, leaving his widow, Nancy, surviving him, and that Nancy died November 5, 1909, leaving a will; that Emily L. Hazard never married, and died April 1, 1909; that Mary W. Hazard never married, and died September 22, 1910.
It is further admitted that the married daughters of Benjamin Hazard, referred to in the clause secondly above quoted, were, at the date of the will, Margaret L. Stevens and Harriet L. Brooks; that Margaret L. Stevens survived the testatrix, and was living at the time when this bill was filed, and when this cause was argued, but it now appears that she has since died on or about the 4th day of November, 1913; that Harriet L. Brooks died January 26, 1904, leaving a will; that Harriet L. Stevens is the daughter of Harriet L. Brooks, is the surviving executrix of her will, and is also the same person mentioned in the clause secondly above quoted as "Harriet the daughter of my niece Harriet."
The bill also sets forth with much detail the numerous other collateral heirs of the testatrix; but, in our view of the proper construction of the will, it becomes unnecessary to mention them.
The prior life interests in the income of the trust fund for the benefit of the single nieces, created under the clause of the will first above quoted, were determined by the death of the last survivor of them, Mary W. Hazard, on September 22, 1910. The distribution of the trust fund to the utlimate beneficiaries has therefore become due, and the questions raised by the trustee in the bill may be briefly stated as follows:
(1) Whether the gift to the beneficiaries under the clause of the will secondly above quoted vested at the death of the testatrix, or was such vesting deferred until the determination of the prior life estates?
(2) Whether the gift under said clause was to a Class of beneficiaries, or to them individually and distributively.
(3) Whether or not the death of Payton R. Hazard, a beneficiary named in said clause, in the lifetime of the testatrix, caused a lapse of the gift as to him, and left it, so far as it was a gift to him, intestate estate to pass to the next of kin of the testatrix.
The intention of the testatrix with regard to the disposition of her estate is easily gathered from the terms of the will itself in the light of the facts above set forth as to the relation between herself and her beneficiaries. It is evident that her general intent was to benefit issue of her deceased brother Benjamin Hazard. The only bequest to any person other than such issue is the first, a comparatively unimportant bequest of a suit of red curtains to Ruth H. Bateman, daughter of a deceased brother Thomas. Every other bequest of specific articles is to her nieces, the five daughters of her deceased brother Benjamin, of whom three were single and two were married at the date of the will. The gift of the income of the trust fund created as above set forth was to said three single daughters while unmarried, and to the survivors, etc., and the gift of "my whole property," in case of the decease or marriage of all the single nieces, was to "all the married daughters of my said brother Benjamin Hazard deceased, and to Harriet, the daughter of my niece Harriet and to my nephews Payton and Daniel, to be equally divided between them." As has already appeared, the grandniece Harriet was a granddaughter of Benjamin Hazard, and Payton and Daniel were his sons. The above-quoted clauses then dispose of all the residue of the property of the testatrix (she having only personal estate as above shown) to issue of Benjamin Hazard. The primary intent was to create a trust fund for the benefit of the unmarried nieces, during spinsterhood, by giving them a joint interest in the income, determinable upon marriage or decease, with survivorship, and subject to this provision to dispose of all the corpus of the fund as above set forth. The manifest intent was to dispose of all the estate, and leave nothing to be distributed as intestate property.
It is further to be noted that the above-quoted language clearly shows that, while it was the primary intention of the testatrix to devote all the income of her residuary estate to said single nieces jointly until they either married or died, it was not her intention that the marriage of either of them should deprive the one married of all interest in her estate, but only of the benefit of the income until the last unmarried survivor either married or died. It is obvious that it was her intention that when one of the nieces married, she should drop out of the provision for income, and should become one of the married daughters, and so become entitled to an ultimate share of the corpus of the trust fund upon the termination of the last life interest. So that when the niece Nancy married, as above set forth, after the date of the will, she ceased to be interested in the income, and became entitled to a proportionate share in the ultimate disposition of the trust fund, being included in the language, "in case all my aforesaid single nieces shall have deceased or married, it is my will, and I hereby give and bequeath in that case, my whole property to all the married daughters," etc.
In answer to the questions specifically above set forth, the court is of...
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...of beneficiaries as members of a class. Essentially similar descriptions of beneficiaries have been given that effect. See Hazard v. Stevens, 36 R.I. 90, 88 A. 980; Rhode Island Hospital Trust Co. v. Calef, 43 R.I. 518, 112 A. 787. In our opinion the present designations of the beneficiarie......
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...So construed, the beneficiaries of her disposition constitute a group and her will speaks the language of a class gift. Hazard v. Stevens, 36 R.I. 90, 99, 88 A.2d 980; R. I. Hospital Trust Co. v. Calef, In our judgment the primary members of that group were her cousins, and the children of ......
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...the class is determined at the period of distribution which in such a case is the expiration of the preceding life estate. Hazard v. Stevens, 36 R.I. 90, 88 A. 980; Perry v. Brown, 34 R.I. 203, 226, 227, 83 A. 8; Greene v. Rathbun, 32 R.I. 145, 156, 78 A. 528; Rozell v. Rozell, 217 Mich. 32......
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