Presbyterian Church in U.S. v. Eastern Heights Presbyterian Church

• Decision Date: 14 April 1969
• Docket Number: 24367,Nos. 24366,s. 24366
• Citation: 225 Ga. 259,167 S.E.2d 658
• Parties: PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN the UNITED STATES et al. v. EASTERN HEIGHTS PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH. PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN the UNITED STATES et al. v. MARY ELIZABETH BLUE HULL MEMORIAL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

Page 658

167 S.E.2d 658

225 Ga. 259

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN the UNITED STATES et al. v. EASTERN HEIGHTS PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH.

PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN the UNITED STATES et al. v. MARY ELIZABETH BLUE HULL MEMORIAL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH.

Nos. 24366, 24367.

Supreme Court of Georgia.

April 14, 1969.

Rehearing Denied May 8, 1969.

Syllabus by the Court

1. The Supreme Court of the United States having stricken a portion of Georgia's implied trust theory, the remainder falls also, and there is no implied trust on the local church property in favor of the general church.

2. Since legal title to the property is in the local churches, the judgments sustaining their claims to such property is affirmed.

Frank S. Cheatham, Jr., Savannah, King & Spalding, Robert B. Troutman, A. Felton Jenkins, Charles L. Gowen, Atlanta, for appellants.

Owen H. Page, Frank B. Zeigler, Richard T. Cowan, James E. McAleer, Savannah, for appellees.

GRICE, Justice.

The judgments of this court of January 18, 1968, Presbyterian Church in the United States v. Eastern Heights Presbyterian Church and Presbyterian Church in the United States v. Mary Elizabeth Blue Hull Memorial Presbyterian Church, 224 Ga. 61, 159 S.E.2d 690, which affirmed the judgments of the Superior Court of Chatham County, were on January 27, 1969, reversed by the Supreme Court of the United States, 393 U.S. 440, 89 S.Ct. 601, 21 L.Ed.2d 658. In its mandate to this court, the Supreme Court of the United States ordered that 'these causes be remanded to the Supreme Court of the State of Georgia for further proceedings not inconsistent with the opinion of this court.'

Upon return of the cases to this court, in response to our request, counsel for the appellants and for the appellees have filed briefs as to further proceedings by this court.

When the cases were before us for review (224 Ga. 61, 159 S.E.2d 690 supra), we affirmed the judgments of the trial court, which were based on jury verdicts in favor of the local churches' claims to the local church property after they had withdrawn from the general church, charging it with departure from its original tenets of faith and practice.

1. Under Georgia law, insofar as churches with a connective form of government are concerned, there has been implied a trust on local church property for the benefit of the general church, but as a part of this rule the implied trust has been conditioned on the general church adhering to its tenets of faith and practice existing at the time of affiliation by the local church. See Mack v. Kime, 129 Ga. 1, 58 S.E. 184, 24 L.R.A.,N.S., 675; Code § 22-408. In our review of these cases, we applied this rule of law.

However, the United States Supreme Court, in reviewing our decision, held that although civil courts are the proper forum for resolving property disputes, the First Amendment to the United States Constitution forbids them from determining ecclesiastical questions in the process. For this reason, it reversed our decision, stating that 'the departure-from-doctrine element of Georgia's implied trust theory can play no role in any future judicial proceedings.'

This being the case, the entire theory must fall. Since Georgia chose to adopt the implied trust theory with this element as a condition, this court must assume that it would not have adopted the theory...