Taylor v. McClintock

• Decision Date: 22 June 1908
• Citation: 112 S.W. 405
• Parties: TAYLOR et al. v. McCLINTOCK.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

112 S.W. 405

TAYLOR et al. v. McCLINTOCK.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

June 22, 1908.

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Appeal from Circuit Court, Pulaski County; Edward W. Winfield, Judge.

In the matter of C. M. Taylor's estate. Maud J. McClintock contested a will offered for probate by Julia P. Taylor and another, executors. From a judgment of the circuit court for contestant on appeal from the probate court, proponents and others appeal. Reversed, and remanded for a new trial.

Proponents' third requested instruction, as modified and given, referred to under point 3 of the second subdivision of the opinion, reads as follows:

"Periodical expressions by Dr. Taylor of apprehensions, or even belief, that his daughter did not love him or had been disobedient, or was undutiful, or had deceived him, which were made in a spirit of anger after some exciting provocation, and which did not become a fixed and abiding belief, controlling his actions with reference to his daughter, would not be a delusion. Before the jury can find that there was any delusion, it must find that there was an insane delusion, which was fixed and enduring, and which controlled the mind and acts of Dr. Taylor with reference to his daughter; and, to invalidate the will on that account, it must appear that such a delusion existed, and that it influenced the making of the will so far as it affects the contestant.

"On the other hand, if, taking all the evidence together and in connection with the provisions of the will itself, the jury shall find that C. M. Taylor was not of sound mind and capable of understanding and comprehending the desert of his daughter at the time the will was executed, you are instructed that it was not his will."

Instruction 8, given for contestant and referred to under point 7 of subdivision 2 of the opinion, reads as follows:

"A person may be entirely sound mentally on all subjects or as to all individuals save one, and as to that particular subject or individual his mind may be so diseased as to render it impossible to say that he is of sound mind and is capable of reasoning and exercising a sound judgment in regard to the subject of such delusion, or of comprehending the obligations he may owe to the individual who is the subject of the delusion; and the jury are instructed, in considering the question as to the mental soundness of C. M. Taylor and his capacity to make a will at the date of the paper offered for probate, they should take into consideration all the facts and circumstances adduced at this hearing bearing upon his relations to his daughter and his alleged delusion in regard to the state of her affection for him. And if you find that he entertained an insane delusion in regard to her which in any way affected the disposition made by him of his property in his will, you will find for the contestant, notwithstanding you believe he was perfectly sane and sound mentally in all other respects, and was so regarded by his friends and business associates."

Proponents' seventh requested instruction, referred to under point 9, subdivision 2, of the opinion, reads as follows:

"No disorder of the moral affections, feelings, or propensities, unless it is accompanied by insane delusion, will incapacitate a person to make a will, or invalidate a will when made by him."

Proponents' seventeenth requested instruction, referred to under point 9, subdivision 2, of the opinion, reads as follows:

"You are instructed a person has the absolute right to dispose of his property by will as he sees fit, and the law does not attempt to say who should be, or who should not be, the objects of his bounty; nor does it inquire whether the will is reasonable or unreasonable, just or unjust, or even whether it is natural or unnatural, in dealing with what might be deemed by others the natural objects of his affections. And although that Dr. Taylor exhibited likes and dislikes among his relatives or members of the family for which you might not discern an intelligible reason, or that his regard for his daughter was not such as you would expect from a father towards his child, or that he was prejudiced against her, and that the disposition of his property by the will was unnatural or unjust, or if you find that his affections were disordered, this is no ground on which the law will avoid his will; for even moral insanity — that is, disorder of the moral affections or propensities — alone, unless accompanied by insane delusion, is not sufficient to invalidate a will, or to incapacitate a person to make one."

Contestant's requested instruction No. 2 and proponents' twenty-first requested instruction, referred to under point 10, subdivision 2, of the opinion, read as follows, respectively:

"(2) If the jury believe from all the evidence that C. M. Taylor did not, at the time the paper offered for probate was executed, have sufficient mental capacity to understand his natural obligations to his daughter, the contestant, and to comprehend her deserts as his daughter, he was of unsound mind within the meaning of the law, and incapable of making a will, and they should find for the contestant."

"(21) If a testator has the capacity to understand his obligation to his children, his mere disregard of such obligation does not render his will invalid. In such case he may make such disposition as he pleases — one which makes an unequal distribution amongst his children, as well as one which makes an equal distribution."

Under point 4, subdivision 3, of the opinion, proponents complain that the court erred in permitting contestant to answer the question of her counsel: "In this letter it is stated that you failed to give your father your confidence when you were with him. Please state if the statement in the letter is correct" — which she said was not correct, and also in permitting her to answer the question, "I wish you to state what your course was in regard to advising and informing your father of your relations with Mr. McClintock, during the entire period of your correspondence and engagement to him, before your marriage," her answer being, "I was perfectly frank and sincere with him."

Under point 5, subdivision 3, of the opinion, proponents complain that the court improperly permitted contestant to ask a witness to answer the question, "Did she exhibit at any time any greater fondness for any person than she did for her father?" witness' answer being, "She did not."

Under point 13, subdivision 3, of the opinion, it appears that, on a witness called to testify as to testator's sanity being asked to state the general character of the issues in the lawsuit in which witness was testator's counsel and in which testator did all the work of preparation, looking up witnesses, etc., objection was sustained to the question, and that objection was also sustained to a question as to whether the issue in such lawsuit was one of monomania of one from whom testator acquired land.

Under point 14, subdivision 3, of the opinion, contestant complained of the exclusion of a question asked witnesses as to whether they had ever heard testator's sanity questioned until after his death.

Under point 15, subdivision 3, of the opinion, it appears that a witness called by proponents to prove testator's sanity was asked, over proponents' objection, if he had found farming profitable; the testimony appearing to have been offered to contradict testator's statement that during certain years he made no money, or to prove that he had made money farming.

Under point 16 of the third subdivision of the opinion it appears that a witness stated that testator was very painstaking, etc., and that as a bank director witness thought he went to extremes by seeking information of bookkeepers that should have been gotten from the cashier, and that testator had been sued as a director. Proponents attempted to show by witness that the principal charge against testator and his co-directors was that they accepted the statement of officers, instead of going to the books and bookkeepers, as explaining why testator did what witness criticised; but the court excluded such testimony.

Under point 18, subdivision 3, of the opinion, proponents complain that the court erred in not permitting them to ask the attorney who prepared the will whether he intended to reduce the benefit contestant would receive when he suggested to testator that testator substitute an absolute gift of $10,000 for the annuity he named when giving his first directions as to the will.

Under point 19, subdivision 3, of the opinion, proponents complain of the admission of evidence that testator acquired his fortune through his wife from one Dr. Jordan, and of the exclusion of testimony of one who examined the probate records that Dr. Jordan's estate was insolvent and paid but a very small dividend to his creditors.

Under point 21, subdivision 3, of the opinion, contestant complained that, to show that Dr. Jordan was a man of great wealth and that testator had gotten from him so large an estate that his belief as to his daughter's affections became disordered and incapacitated to make a will, a witness was permitted to state that "in 1863 they burned 3,000 bales of cotton belonging to Dr. Jordan."

Under point 22, subdivision 3, of the opinion, proponents complain because a witness was not allowed to state what difficulty testator's friends, family, and acquaintances would have experienced in detecting that he was insane between 1895 and 1904, based on the supposition that testator was in the first stages of paranoia as early as 1880, when he was about 50 years old, and that he lived after the disease developed 24 years.

Under point 23, subdivision 3, of the opinion, proponents complain of the exclusion of questions asked experts on cross-examination, after each had stated that he was a physician in general practice and had never made a specialty of treating...