Slattery v. Wason

• Decision Date: 28 February 1890
• Parties: SLATTERY v. WASON et al.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

151 Mass. 266

23 N.E. 843

SLATTERY v. WASON et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

February 28, 1890

COUNSEL

Champlin, Ryther & Wentworth and E.I. Baker, for plaintiff.

Harding & Wigglesworth, for defendants Hyde, Powers, and Davis.

A.A Ranney and F. Ranney, for defendant Wason.

OPINION

W ALLEN, J.

It was decided in Bank v. Adams, 133 Mass. 170, that the donor of the income of a trust fund to one for his life might qualify the gift by a provision that the right to receive the income should not be alienable. The language of the court in Baker v. Brown, 146 Mass. 369, 15 N.E. 783 referring to that case, is applicable to the case at bar "Such provision need not be in express terms, but it is sufficient if the intention is fairly to be gathered from the instrument, when construed in the light of the circumstances. The only question in the present case is whether enough appears to show such intention." The intention that the right given in the instrument under consideration should not be alienable is obvious from the nature of the gift. There is no gift of the whole income, as in Bank v. Adams, nor even of the whole income for the support of the beneficiary, as in Maynard v. Cleaves, 149 Mass. 307, 21 N.E. 376, and in many other cases, but at most a right to so much of the fund as shall be needed for her support. When the whole income, or a definite sum, is given to the beneficiary for his support, the whole belongs to him, and is to be applied by him at his discretion; and the expression of the purpose for which it is given is not deemed to be the expression of an intention that the right to secure it shall not be alienable. But, when the right given is for a support out of a fund which is given to another, the right is in its nature inalienable, and the intention of the donor that it shall not be alienated is presumed. The right may be extinguished, but it cannot be aliened, because a payment to an alienee cannot be a payment for the support of the beneficiary, and no payments are required to be made by the owner of the fund except such as are for that purpose. The only escape from this conclusion is to hold that the court, on this bill by a creditor, will fix the amounts and times of future payments for support, and decree that they shall be fixed sums, due, but not payable, to the beneficiary, the right to which she can alien. One answer to this is that the court will not interfere to change the relations of the parties at the request of a stranger. The owner of the fund is not a trustee, and his mother is not a cestui que trust who, and whose representatives, can...