Presbytery of Elijah Parish Lovejoy v. Jaeggi

• Decision Date: 18 December 1984
• Docket Number: No. 65853,65853
• Citation: 682 S.W.2d 465
• Parties: PRESBYTERY OF ELIJAH PARISH LOVEJOY by its representatives, the commission members named below, and Cortley Burroughs, Tracy Houston, Manley Mace, William T. Hancock, Richard D. Shewmaker and Lorna Wagner, and Presbytery of Elijah Parish Lovejoy, Inc., a Missouri pro forma decree corporation, Plaintiffs-Respondents, v. Paul JAEGGI, Paul Barker, Harold Bowerman, Robert Canfield, Ben Carter, George Devlin, William Dick, Karl Dolde, Jim Hydar, Terry Jones, George Lanz, Robert Parks, Frank Rall, Dan Smith, Darold Strand, Arthur Tapy, and Memorial Presbyterian Church of St. Louis, a Missouri pro forma decree corporation, Defendants-Appellants.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

Page 465

682 S.W.2d 465

PRESBYTERY OF ELIJAH PARISH LOVEJOY by its representatives,

the commission members named below, and Cortley Burroughs,

Tracy Houston, Manley Mace, William T. Hancock, Richard D.

Shewmaker and Lorna Wagner, and Presbytery of Elijah Parish

Lovejoy, Inc., a Missouri pro forma decree corporation, Plaintiffs-Respondents, v. Paul JAEGGI, Paul Barker, Harold Bowerman, Robert Canfield, Ben Carter, George Devlin, William Dick, Karl Dolde, Jim

Hydar, Terry Jones, George Lanz, Robert Parks, Frank Rall,

Dan Smith, Darold Strand, Arthur Tapy, and Memorial

Presbyterian Church of St. Louis, a Missouri pro forma

decree corporation, Defendants-Appellants.

No. 65853.

Supreme Court of Missouri,

En Banc.

Dec. 18, 1984.

Rehearing Denied Jan. 15, 1985.

Timothy Belz, Mark Belz, St. Louis, W. Jack Williamson, Greenville, Ala., for defendants-appellants.

Richard D. Shewmaker, John B. Shewmaker, Clayton, for plaintiffs-respondents.

GEORGE M. FLANIGAN, Special Judge.

The principal adversaries in this church property dispute are plaintiff Presbytery of Elijah Parish Lovejoy, a presbytery of the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, ("UPCUSA" or "the national church"), and defendant Memorial Presbyterian Church of St. Louis, a Missouri pro forma decree corporation, ("Memorial" or "the local church"). At issue are their respective rights to property which prior to this action was in the control of Memorial.

On July 21, 1980, at a duly called concurrent meeting of the congregation and corporation of Memorial, a resolution was adopted, by a vote of 153 to 0 with one abstention, to terminate "the voluntary association which has existed until now" between Memorial and the national church. Although some members of the congregation failed to vote, under church rules, local and national, "silent members, unless excused from voting, must be considered as acquiescing with the majority."

The individual plaintiffs are members of a commission, appointed on April 25, 1981, and acting under the authority of the national church. The commission would assume control of the property in the event the action succeeded. The individual defendants are "ruling elder members of the session" of Memorial.

The trial court, sitting without a jury, found the issues in favor of the plaintiffs and ordered the defendants to deliver to the commission "all assets, funds and property, both real and personal, now under the management and control of [Memorial]." The judgment also required the defendants to deliver to plaintiffs possession of the church building located at 201 Skinker Blvd., St. Louis, Missouri, and to account to the commission for all assets previously disposed of "for purposes other than purposes of [Memorial] as a particular church of [the national church]."

Defendants appealed to the Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District, which reversed the judgment. The cause was then transferred to this Court which now determines the same as on original appeal. Rule 83.09. ¹

The dispositive contention of Memorial is that the judgment should be reversed because (a) the trial court erred in holding that Hayes v. Manning, 263 Mo. 1, 172 S.W. 897 (1914), required deference to the decision of the national church with regard to the control of the disputed property, (b) the trial court erred in holding that Missouri law forbids the use of "the neutral principles of law approach" enunciated in Jones v. Wolf, 443 U.S. 595, 99 S.Ct. 3020, 61 L.Ed.2d 775 (1979), for resolution of church property disputes, and (c) the latter approach, applied to the evidence, required a finding in favor of Memorial.

The trial court, in a memorandum accompanying its judgment, found that the form of organization of UPCUSA is hierarchical and that under Missouri law as expressed in Hayes, it, the trial court, was required to give deference to the decision of the highest tribunal within the national church. The trial court also indicated that if it were free to apply the neutral principles approach to the instant facts "it might reach a more equitable result ... this result would be to find in favor of [Memorial]."

This Court now adopts the "neutral principles of law" approach as the exclusive method for resolution of church property disputes. To the extent that Hayes is inconsistent with this holding, it should no longer be followed. Neither side claims that the neutral principles approach is inconsistent with any of the religious freedom provisions of the Constitution of Missouri, [art. I, § 5, § 6, and § 7], or with Missouri statutes [§ 352.010, et seq.] pertaining to religious associations. For the reasons which follow, this court finds that the record, viewed under the neutral principles approach, requires reversal of the trial court's judgment.

In its brief Memorial takes the position that UPCUSA "is not a hierarchical denomination, in which power flows from the top down, but is rather a connectional or representative denomination, in which power flows from the bottom up, through an ascending scale of judicatories." The brief of UPCUSA describes its government as "representative or republican." Some of the cases discussed below hold, as did the trial court, that UPCUSA is hierarchical. Since the neutral principles approach "accommodate[s] all forms of religious organization and polity," 443 U.S. at 603, 99 S.Ct. at 3025, this Court need not concern itself with any issue with regard to UPCUSA's form of organization.

Jones involved a dispute over the ownership of church property following a schism in a local church affiliated with hierarchical church organization. The "question for decision", said the Court, was "whether civil courts, consistent with the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution, may resolve the dispute on the basis of 'neutral principles of law,' or whether they must defer to the resolution of an authoritative tribunal of the hierarchical church." 443 U.S. at 597, 99 S.Ct. at 3022.

The court pointed out that "the State" has an obvious and legitimate interest in the peaceful resolution of property disputes, and in providing a civil forum where the ownership of church property can be determined conclusively. The court stated:

It is also clear, however, that 'The First Amendment severely circumscribes the role that civil courts may play in resolving church property disputes.' ... Most importantly, the First Amendment prohibits civil courts from resolving church property disputes on the basis of religious doctrine and practice.... As a corollary to this commandment, the Amendment requires that civil courts defer to the resolution of issues of religious doctrine or polity by the highest court of a hierarchical church organization.... Subject to these limitations, however, the First Amendment does not dictate that a State must follow a particular method of resolving church property disputes. Indeed, 'a State may adopt any one of various approaches for settling church property disputes so long as it involves no consideration of doctrinal matters, whether the ritual and liturgy of worship or the tenets of faith.'

443 U.S. at 602, 99 S.Ct. at 3025.

The court then said that "at least in general outline," the "neutral principles of law" approach is consistent with the foregoing principles. Id. The neutral principals approach was approved in Maryland & Va. Churches v. Sharpsburg Church, 396 U.S. 367, 90 S.Ct. 499, 24 L.Ed.2d 582 (1970), where a state court settled a local church property dispute on the basis of the language of the deeds, the terms of the local church charters, the state statutes governing the holding of church property, and the provisions in the constitution of the general church concerning the ownership and control of church property. That approach, said the court in Maryland & Va. Churches, entailed "no inquiry into religious doctrine." 396 U.S. at 368, 90 S.Ct. at 500.

In Jones the Court held that a State is "constitutionally entitled to adopt neutral principles of law as a means of adjudicating a church property dispute." 443 U.S. at 604, 99 S.Ct. at 3026. The primary advantages of that approach, said the court, are "that it is completely secular in operation, and yet flexible enough to accommodate all forms of religious organization and polity." Id. at 603, 99 S.Ct. at 3025. (Emphasis added.) The court also said:

The method relies exclusively on objective, well-established concepts of trust and property law familiar to lawyers and judges. It thereby promises to free civil courts completely from entanglement in questions of religious doctrine, polity, and practice. Furthermore, the neutral-principles analysis shares the peculiar genius of private-law systems in general--flexibility in ordering private rights and obligations to reflect the intentions of the parties. Through appropriate reversionary clauses and trust provisions, religious societies can specify what is to happen to church property in the event of a particular contingency, or what religious body will determine the ownership in the event of a schism or doctrinal controversy. In this manner, a religious organization can ensure that a dispute over the ownership of church property will be resolved in accord with the desires of the members.

Id.

Finally, the court held that a civil court, in examining a religious document pertinent to the dispute:

must take special care to scrutinize the document in purely secular terms, and not to rely on religious precepts in determining whether the document indicates that the parties have intended to create a trust [in favor of the general church]. In addition, there may be cases where the deed, the corporate charter, or the constitution of the general church incorporates religious concepts in the provisions relating to the ownership of property. If in such a case the interpretation of the instruments of ownership would require the civil court to resolve a religious controversy, then the...