Philips' Estate, In re
| Citation | 54 Wis.2d 296,195 N.W.2d 485 |
| Decision Date | 28 March 1972 |
| Docket Number | No. 27,27 |
| Parties | In re ESTATE of Margaret Pearl PHILIPS, Decd. LA CROSSE TRUST CO., Exr., Appellant, v. Ruth STORANDT et al., Respondents. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court of Wisconsin |
This appeal concerns the effect of a joint will entered into by the deceased, Margaret Pearl Philips, and her husband, Dr. William J. Philips. On February 6, 1937, Dr. and Mrs. Philips executed a joint will containing the following provisions pertinent to this controversy:
'We, William J. Philips, and Margaret Pearl Philips, his wife, both of the City of La Crosse, La Crosse County, Wisconsin, each being of sound mind and memory, do hereby make, publish and declare the following to be our last will and testament, hereby revoking all former wills by us or each of us heretofore made.
'WHEREAS, the property of the aforesaid testators, William J. Philips and Margaret Pearl Philips is the product of their joint efforts, and, whereas, they have no children, it is the desire of the testators that their property, after the death of both testators, be divided approximately equally among the testators' respective heirs in accordance with the wishes of each testator.
'It is the intention that 'equal division' referred to shall mean one-half of the entire joint property of the said testators at the time of the first testator's death.
'. . .
'It is the intention of the testators that on the death of the last surviving testator the equal division referred to be and hereby is bequeathed in the following manner: . . .
'. . .
'It is the intention of the testators that the surviving testator shall have the right by codicil to change the bequests of the equal division referred to to said testator's heirs, but may not change the bequests to the heirs of the first deceased testator.'
On June 6, 1945, Dr. Philips died, leaving an estate of $33,919. By order of the county court of La Crosse county in January, 1946, all of these assets were assigned to Mrs. Philips.
Over the years following her husband's death Mrs. Philips, through shrewd investment, increased the value of her estate to $451,042 at the time of her death, July 17, 1970. In September, 1967, in an apparent effort to exclude assets from passing to her husband's family, Mrs. Philips executed a document enumerating which assets she had received directly from her husband's estate and which assets were the result of her investment of the income from the estate. The appreciated value of those assets directly attributable to Dr. Philips' estate was $173,350 at the time of Mrs. Philips' death, while the value of the assets resulting from her investment of the income was $277,692.
The question raised in the county court of La Crosse county was whether Dr. Philips' heirs take half of the $173,350 or half of the entire estate amounting to $451,000. The county court, Hon. Eugene A. Toepel presiding, took testimony and received briefs on the matter; it decided that all of the assets in Mrs. Philips' estate were the result of the assets she had received from her husband, either directly or through the investment of the income. The court also determined that the doctor's heirs were entitled to one-half of the entire estate of the deceased. The La Crosse Trust Company, as executor, appeals from the judgment assigning half of the assets to the doctor's heirs. The doctor's heirs are the respondents.
Hale, Skemp, Hanson, Schnurrer & Skemp, La Crosse, for appellant.
Steele, Smyth, Klos & Flynn, Jerome J. Klos (for Storandt and Weis), William J. Sauer, La Crosse (for Netta Philips), for respondents.
The sole issue on this appeal is whether the doctor's heirs receive one-half of the entire estate of his deceased widow, or whether they take one-half of only those assets transferred from his estate conveyed to her following his death in 1945.
At the time of her death, Mrs. Philips possessed no assets independently acquired by way of other inheritance, gift or otherwise; her entire estate of over $451,000 was the result of the investment, sale, and reinvestment of assets received from her husband's estate in 1946. This fact makes for an important distinction in the present situation from that presented if Dr....
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