Stewart v. Stewart
| Decision Date | 16 December 1942 |
| Docket Number | 684. |
| Citation | 23 S.E.2d 306,222 N.C. 387 |
| Parties | STEWART v. STEWART. |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
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Dalton & Lovelace and R.T. Pickens, all of High Point, for plaintiff-appellee.
Louis J. Fisher, Jr., and Grover H. Jones, both of High Point, for defendant-appellant.
The only question debated on this appeal is as to the meaning of that part of the antenuptial agreement which provides that if plaintiff survive R.K. Stewart as his widow, she shall receive and accept from his estate after his death the proceeds from certain policies of insurance on his life in which his estate was beneficiary.
The court below held in effect that it means that plaintiff should receive and accept the amount of money which, under the terms of the designated policies, was collectible, and which was collected thereon from the insurance companies undiminished by the debt to the Wachovia Bank and Trust Company created by R.K. Stewart after the agreement was made. With this we are in accord.
In this State a man and woman, contemplating marriage, may enter into a valid contract with respect to the property and property rights of each after marriage, and in equity such contracts will be enforced as written. As each has agreed, so shall he or she be bound. These are some of the cases in point: Gause v. Hale, 37 N.C. 241; Hooks v Lee, 43 N.C. 157; Brooks v. Austin, 95 N.C. 474; Wright v. Westbrook, 121 N.C. 155, 28 S.E. 298; Harris v. Russell, 124 N.C. 547, 32 S.E. 958; Perkins v. Brinkley, 133 N.C. 86, 45 S.E. 465.
Like other contracts, if an antenuptial agreement is not ambiguous, it should be construed in accordance with its wording to effectuate the intention of the parties as it existed at the time of the execution of the agreement. "In arriving at this intent, words are prima facie to be given their ordinary meaning". Atlantic & N.C.R. Co. v. Atlantic & N.C.R. Co., 147 N.C. 368, 61 S.E. 185, 190, 15 Ann.Cas. 363, 125 Am.St.Rep. 550.
"The words employed, if capable of more than one meaning, are to be given that meaning which it is apparent the parties intended them to have", Hoke, J., in Atlantic & N.C.R. Co. v. Atlantic & N.C.R. Co., supra, quoting Beech on Modern Law Contracts, Section 702. See King v. Davis, 190 N.C. 737, 130 S.E. 707. See also Jones v. Casstevens, N.C., 23 S.E.2d 303 at this term.
Moreover, in this State antenuptial agreements are to be construed liberally so as to secure the protection of those interests which from the very nature of the instrument it must be presumed were thereby intended to be secured. Gause v. Hale, supra.
In the case at hand, debate as to the intention of the parties seems to turn on the meaning of the word "proceeds". Webster defines "proceeds" as "that which results, proceeds or accrues from some possession or transaction". Webster's International Dictionary. Giving to it this meaning in the connection in which it is used in the antenuptial agreement, there is no uncertainty...
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