Naylor's Adm'r v. Moffatt

• Citation: 29 Mo. 126
• Parties: NAYLOR'S ADMINISTRATOR, Plaintiff in Error, v. MOFFATT, Defendant in Error.
• Decision Date: 31 October 1859
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

29 Mo. 126

NAYLOR'S ADMINISTRATOR, Plaintiff in Error,

v.MOFFATT, Defendant in Error.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

October Term, 1859.

1. Letters testamentary granted to an executor in one state have no extra territorial force.

2. Letters testamentary granted to an executor in Virginia give him no title to property of the testator in this state, and he can not, in his official capacity, maintain an action in this state to recover such property.

3. A grant of administration by a county court is a judicial act, and as such must be conclusive on all other courts until it is revoked; the validity of such grants can not be attacked collaterally.

4. An administrator duly appointed by a county court of this state is entitled to the possession of the personal property of the deceased found here, and his right to sue for such possession is exclusive of the foreign executor, distributees, and all others.

Error to Knox Circuit Court.

The facts sufficiently appear in the opinion of the court.

Broadhead, for plaintiff in error.

I. The circuit court could not look behind the action of the county court to determine whether that court had acted properly in granting letters of administration. The validity of the grant of letters cannot be attacked in a collateral proceeding. (24 Mo. 265.) If the petition disclosed the fact that the property had been administered on by the executor in Virginia, the estate settled up, the debts paid, and distribution made, then it might be questionable whether another administration could be granted here. No such facts appeared on the face of the petition. It does not even appear that the executor accepted the appointment, or that he had letters testamentary granted him in Virginia. The property is here, and for aught that appears there may be debts due here.

Dryden & Lipscomb, for defendant in error.

I. The demurrer was properly sustained. The administration was not closed; was in Angus W. McDonald, the executor, and the letters of administration granted plaintiff could not divest his title. If the administration was closed, then the distributees alone had the right. The administration of Angus W. McDonald is the primary administration. His right to the possession attached in Virginia and followed the property to Missouri. (10 Mo. 141; 15 Mo. 118.) Riley v. McCord, 24 Mo. 265, has no application to the case.

EWING, Judge, delivered the opinion of the court.

This was an action by Edward C. McDonald, administrator with the will annexed of the estate of William Naylor, for the recovery of certain slaves. The petition alleges that William Naylor died in the state of Virginia in 1840, leaving a will appointing an executor in that state, and that the slaves in controversy should be [free] upon attaining to certain ages therein specified; that the said will was duly admitted to probate in Virginia; that Susan Naylor, the widow of deceased, “under the provision of the laws of that state, for a part of her dower in the estate of the deceased, took the slaves in controversy” and brought them to Missouri, and kept them in her possession until her death in 1849, when the said slaves passed into the possession of her son John S. Naylor, who hired them out until his death in 1853 for the executor of his father's will, and [they] were held by him for the said executor, Angus W. McDonald, at the time of [the death of] him, the said J. S. Naylor; that after this, by some means not stated, defendant got possession of said slaves; that letters of administration with the will ...