Stanley v. Safe-Deposit & Trust Co.
| Decision Date | 01 April 1898 |
| Citation | 40 A. 53,87 Md. 450 |
| Parties | STANLEY et al. v. SAFE-DEPOSIT & TRUST CO. OF BALTIMORE. |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Appeal from orphans' court, Baltimore county.
Petition by Caroline H. Stanley and others against the Safe-Deposit & Trust Company of Baltimore, executor of Joseph Cox, deceased to submit certain questions as to the probate of the will to a jury in a court of law. From an order dismissing the petition, plaintiffs appeal. Affirmed.
Argued before MCSHERRY, C.J., and BRISCOE, BRYAN, PEARCE, PAGE BOYD, and FOWLER, JJ.
Charles H. Stanley, Gill & Preston, and Tho. R. Clendinen, for appellants. Arthur W. Machen, Ber. Carter, and D. G McIntosh, for appellee.
This is an appeal from the orphans' court of Baltimore county and it brings up for review the propriety of an order refusing to transmit to the circuit court for trial a proposed issue of fact. Joseph Cox wrote with his own hand, and then, on the 13th day of November, 1896, executed in due form, his last will and testament. On the 14th day of December following he died. The Safe-Deposit & Trust Company of Baltimore was named in the will as the executor. On the 22d of December the executor propounded the paper for probate in the orphans' court of Baltimore county, the testator in the will itself having declared that he was, at the time of its execution, a resident of that county, though he died in the city. The will was admitted to probate, and letters testamentary were granted. Notice to creditors was at once given, inventories were filed, and after the lapse of six months--the period fixed by the statute--a first and final administration account was stated on July 7, 1897. In that account the executor was charged with the entire personal estate, and was allowed credit for the expenses and debts and pecuniary legacies, altogether aggregating $37,445.83, which were paid; and the residue of $94,900.94, less the collateral inheritance tax, was turned over to the Safe-Deposit & Trust Company to be held by it in trust under the provisions of the will. On August 3d, or nearly a month after the estate had been fully and finally settled according to the provisions of the will and the requirements of the statute, the appellants, claiming to be next of kin of the testator, filed in the orphans' court of Baltimore county a petition in which, after alluding to the probate of the will, they alleged that at the time the will was executed Cox was not of sound and disposing mind, that the instrument had been procured by undue influence and by fraud, that Cox had not, in fact, been a resident of Baltimore county, and that the probate of the will in Baltimore county was improper. The petition then prayed that issues might be framed to present these allegations for trial in a court of law. The executor answered, neither admitting nor denying that the petitioners were next of kin of the testator, but flatly contradicting the averments as to mental incapacity, undue influence, fraud, and nonresidence. On October 26th the appellants filed a second petition, asking that preliminary issues involving the inquiries as to whether Cox, at the time of his death, resided in Baltimore city or Baltimore county, and as to whether the appellants were his next of kin, might be transmitted to a court of law for trial. On November 16th the executor filed a supplemental answer, admitting that the appellants were the decedent's next of kin, and on the same day an additional answer was put in, resisting on various grounds the granting of the proposed issue as to nonresidence. In November the orphans' court dismissed the petition of October 26th, which prayed for the transmission of the preliminary issues just above indicated. From that order the pending appeal was taken.
The single question thus presented is whether, under the circumstances stated, the order which refused to grant an issue respecting the residence of Mr. Cox at the time of his decease was correct; and this is the sole question, because the petition of October 26th, which was the only one dismissed by the order appealed from, propounded no other issues than the two of nonresidence and relationship, and the executor's admission that the appellants are the testator's next of kin has eliminated the latter from the controversy. It is undoubtedly true that the orphans' courts are tribunals of special, limited jurisdiction. They have no powers other than those conferred by statute, and such, in addition, as are incident to and necessary for the performance of the ones expressly given. But there can be no question that to them is committed exclusively the authority to admit wills to probate, and to grant letters testamentary and, in cases of intestacy, letters of administration. This authority is, while exclusive, itself also limited. There are circumstances which restrict its exercise to prescribed localities. If the circumstances which give rise to the jurisdiction do not exist in a particular case, the authority to act does not arise. But who is primarily to determine whether those circumstances do exist? The Code fixes the place where a decedent's will must be probated by prescribing that it may be proved in the county wherein letters testamentary or of administration may be granted; and, if such letters may be granted in Baltimore city, then probate may be had in the orphans' court of the city. By section 14, art. 93, Code Pub. Gen. Laws, it is enacted that in cases of intestacy letters of administration may be granted by the orphans' court of the county wherein the deceased's mansion house or residence was situated, or, if he had no mansion house or residence, then letters may be granted in the county where he died. It is apparent, then, if Cox had no mansion house or residence in Baltimore county, and if he died in Baltimore city, that the orphans' court of Baltimore city alone had authority to admit his will to probate; and it is equally manifest that if he was, at the time of his death, a resident of Baltimore county, though he died in the city, the orphans' court of the county was the proper tribunal to take probate of his will. Now, it is obvious that when the will, wherein the testator declared himself to be a resident of Baltimore county, was presented to the orphans' court of that county for probate, that court was required to decide and determine whether it had jurisdiction to admit the will to probate; and therefore, at the threshold, had power to decide and determine whether Mr. Cox had been, in fact, at the time of his death, a resident of the county. This was an inquiry which it was necessary for the orphans' court to make and to decide before it could proceed either to admit the will to probate or to grant letters of administration. The question as to where the decedent had his residence at the time of his death was essentially within the orphans' court's jurisdiction to decide when the will was propounded, unless there had then been framed for trial in the circuit court an issue presenting that inquiry for the finding of a jury. Necessarily and...
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