Peeler v. Peeler

Decision Date10 November 1890
Citation8 So. 392,68 Miss. 141
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
PartiesCLEMENTINE PEELER ET AL. v. C. G. PEELER

FROM the chancery court of Warren county, HON. LAUCH MCLAURIN Chancellor.

The facts are fully stated in the opinion.

Affirmed. Petition denied.

Birchett & Shelton, for appellants.

The only question in the case is who shall have the homestead the widow or the children? This depends upon a construction of § 1277, code 1880. The homestead is an estate created by statute. An examination of all the statutes beginning with Hutchinson's code down to the code of 1880 will show that the tendency of legislation has been uniformly towards making the homestead descend as other property, and vesting in the same persons who would inherit the rest of the property an estate therein as tenants in common, free from the decedent's debts. Under the statute of descent this court has held that grandchildren are so completely on a level with children that a child of a sister of the whole blood will inherit in preference to a sister of half blood, in face of the provision of the statute that there shall be no distinction between children of the whole and half blood except that children of the whole blood are to be preferred to children of the half blood in the same degree. Scott v. Terry, 37 Miss. 65.

The manifest object of the statute is to provide for the exemptionist and his family during his lifetime and for those who are dependent upon him after his death. There can be no doubt that grandchildren constituting a part of the family dependent upon the exemptionist for support are as much members of his family as his own children. The words of a statute are to be understood in the sense in which they best harmonize with the subject of the enactment and the object which the legislature had in view. Endlich on Interpretation of Statutes, § 73. Where the object of the statute was the distribution of an intestate's estate, the term children should be construed to include grandchildren. Eschelman's Appeal, 74 Pa. 42. So if grandchildren are included in the equity of a statute providing for children of a decedent, the word children will be held to include grandchildren. Walton v. Cotton, 19 How. (U. S.) 355.

The statute of descent having placed grandchildren on a level with children, this section which forms a part of the statute must furnish the rule of descent for the homestead in all cases where the children of the exemptionist are dead the grandchildren constitute his family; otherwise the object of the statute would be defeated.

Dabney & McCabe, for appellees.

Even if the applicants were a part of the family of Richmond Peeler at the time of his death, that would not give them the rights which they claim. Under § 1277, the person entitled to exempt property owned by the decedent at the time of his death do not take the same by virtue of being members of his family, but by virtue of their relationship to the decedent. The word children cannot be construed to mean grandchildren. If so, the legislature would have substituted the word heirs for the word children. The word children is usually confined to immediate descendants. It does not include grandchildren or more remote descendants. 3 Am. & Eng. Encyc. of Law, 230-232.

The fact that the widow at the time of the decedent's death owned in her own right a place of residence worth more than the exempt realty, if admitted to be true, cannot help the appellants. They are again met with the fact that the statute limits the right to the homestead in such case to the children of the decedent and not to his grandchildren.

OPINION

WOODS, C. J.

Richmond Peeler died seised and possessed of a homestead and valuable plantation in Warren county. He had been twice married. By his first marriage he had one son, who died during the lifetime of the father. This son left surviving him four children, the appellants herein. By the second marriage he had no children, and the second wife is the appellee. Richmond Peeler and the second wife were living in the homestead on the plantation at the date of his death. His surviving widow, the appellee, was the owner, at the time of her husband's death, of a residence worth $ 2000, or more.

The widow filed her petition in Warren chancery court praying the allotment to her of the exempt real estate of her late husband, and praying partition of the remaining realty, equally, between herself and the four grandchildren above referred to.

The grandchildren answer, and make their answer a cross-petition, by which they admit that they and the widow are tenants in common of all the realty, except the homestead. As to the homestead they assert that they are entitled to the whole of the exempt homestead, and deny that the widow is entitled to any part thereof.

They aver that James Peeler, their father, at the date of his death, together with his wife and his four children, the appellants, was living with his father, Richmond Peeler, and his, James Peeler's, mother, who was then living, and that they were living as one family, although they occupied a separate house: that after the death of James Peeler, his wife and children, the appellants, lived with Richmond Peeler and his first wife, James' mother, as members of their family, though continuing to occupy the house used by James and his family in his lifetime, and which said house was only a short distance from the house occupied by Richmond Peeler and wife: that after the death of the first wife of Richmond Peeler, appellants and their mother continued to live and remain as a part of Richmond Peeler's family, and so continued to live after his second marriage, and up to the day of his death: that Richmond Peeler treated appellants as members of his family, making no distinction between them and appellee: that it was understood between Richmond Peeler and the mother of appellants, after James Peeler's death, that appellants were to be supported and educated by Richmond Peeler, at his own expense, and were to be treated by him as part of his own family, and that this understanding was fully complied with by Richmond Peeler until his death: that Richmond Peeler had no other family than appellants and appellee for some years before his death.

To this cross-petition the appellee demurred, and said demurrer having been by the court sustained, appellants bring the case here, the court being of opinion that an appeal was proper to settle the principles of law involved.

Section 1277 of the code of 1880 declares, that "the property exempt by law from sale under execution or attachment, shall, on the death of the husband or wife owning it, descend to the survivor of them, and the children of the decedent, as tenants in common; and if there shall be no children of the decedent, to the surviving wife or husband; and if there be no such survivor, to the children of the deceased owner. If there be neither a surviving wife nor husband, nor children of the decedent, the exempt property shall be liable for the debts of the decedent, and be disposed of as other property of such decedent. But when the surviving wife or husband shall own a place of residence equal in value to the homestead of the decedent, and the deceased husband or wife shall have surviving no children of the last marriage, but shall have children of a former marriage, the homestead of such decedent shall not descend to the surviving husband or wife, but shall descend to the surviving children of the decedent by such former marriage, as other property."

The case is determinable by a proper construction of the section of the code.

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