Carrington & Co. v. Manning's Heirs

13 Ala. 611
CourtSupreme Court of Alabama
DecidedJanuary 15, 1848
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 13 Ala. 611 (Carrington & Co. v. Manning's Heirs) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Carrington & Co. v. Manning's Heirs, 13 Ala. 611 (Ala. 1848).

Opinions

COLLIER, G. J.

We do not deem it necessary elaborately to consider the doctrine, that a trust for the benefit of creditors, attaches to a devise of real estate, where the words after my debts are paid,” or other equivalent terms are used by the testator. This doctrine owes its introduction into [626]*626British jurisprudence to the exclusion of simple-contract-creditors from the lands of their deceased debtors, as the means of satisfying their demands, and has often been carried to an extent not contemplated by the testators. Treating of this subject, an elementary writer of great respectability says, “it seems to be generally admitted, that the courts have allowed their anxiety to prevent moral injustice, and that men should not sin in their graves, to carry them beyond the limits prescribed by established general principles of construction.” 2 Jarm. on Wills, 520. The trust being ascertained, the debts were considered as withdrawn from the influence of the statute of limitations, where the bar was not complete before the testator’s death. See the learned judgment of Sir William Plumer, in Burke v. Jones, 2 Ves. & B. Rep. 275, and cases there cited; 2 Story’s Eq. § 1245, 1246-7.

It is natural enough that terms not the most significant and direct, should be seized upon to create a trust upon the real estate of a testator for the payment of his debts, where the creditor, according to the law, could not otherwise subject it to liability. There are few men who do not cherish an innate sense of justice, and are pleased to see it accorded to others; no matter how unwilling they may be to render it, where it costs a sacrifice of interest or feeling. Judges are but men, and, with the most honest intentions, sometimes unconsciously yield to the extraneous influences which operate on others. Hence we have no difficulty in accounting for the implication of a trust upon grounds often unwarrantable, in cases analagous in point of .fact to the one now before us. But in this State, where all distinction in dignity as it respeets the debts of a deceased person, is abolished, and a debt by simple contract is placed on the footing with one which is evidenced by a record, if the latter is not a lien on the debtor’s estate, it cannot be expected that the courts should be astute in creating trusts by construction.

According to the common law, if a testator devotes his land to the payment of his debts, without particularizing or distinguishing them, it is regarded but a fair construction of his will, to suppose that he intended to embrace all the debts which were recoverable at the time of his death: But is it [627]*627allowable to deduce this inference from the same terms, applied to the same description of property, where by statute it is already charged with the payment of the decedent’s estate ? Is there not great danger under such a state of the law, of making that which the testator intended as a direction to his executor, when his devisee should be let into the enjoyment of his bounty, a condition precedent to the enjoyment ? In England, personal estate in the hands of the executor is a fund for the payment of the debts, and words which would create a trust upon the realty of the testator, will have the effect of modifying the duties of the executor as the personal representative. True, in Jones v. Scott, 1 R. & Mylne’s Rep. 255, Lord Brougham decided, in opposition to the master of the rolls, that there was no difference “between a charge upon the real and a charge upon the personal estate.” It was admitted that the point had never received a judicial decision, and the Lord Chancellor advised that it should be reconsidered elsewhere. An appeal was accordingly taken to the House of Lords, where, after great consideration, the decree was reversed. Lord Lyndhurst, ill pronouncing the opinion of the court, said, “ Had it been real estate, in that case the plaintiff would have been entitled to recover, but though part of the personalty, it is said to be taken subject to the trust, and the question is, whether a trust of this description declared of the personal estate, prevents the statute of limitations from being set up by way of defence; and I am clearly of opinion that it does not at, all vary the legal liability of the parties, or make any difference with respect, to the effect and operation of the statute itself. The executors take the estate subject to the claim of the creditors ; they are in point of law the trustees for the creditors; the trust is a legal trust, and there is nothing whatever added to their legal liabilities, from the mere circumstance of the testator himself declaring in express terms, that the estate shall be subject to the payment of his debts. I conceive therefore, that the circumstance of there being an express trust in this case, does not make any alteration with respect to the question. And if in ordinary circumstances as to personalty, where there was a mere legal liability, the existence of a mere legal trust would not have been an answer to a plea [628]*628of the statute of limitations ; so I conceive, that in the present case, no alteration can take place, from the existence of an express trust, and that that trust cannot, under these circumstances, be considered as an answer to the statute.” This opinion was approved by Lord Cottenham, in Freake v. Cranefeldt, 3 Mylne & C’s Rep. 500, who said it was a direct authority for holding that a direction in a will for payment of debts, was merely inoperative so far as the personal estate was concerned. See also Crallan v. Oulton, 3 Beav. Rep. 1; Ault v. Goodrich, 4 Russ. Rep. 430; Roosevelt v. Mark, 6 Johns. Ch. Rep. 293; Evans v. Tweedy, 1 Beav. Rep. 55. In Crallan v. Oulton, ut supra, the testator directed his debts to be paid out of his real and personal estate, and provided that if his personal estate should fall short in paying his debts his executors should enter into the receipt of the rents of his freehold, until the same should be wholly paid off. The personal estate was sufficient for the payment of the debts ; it was nevertheless held, that a trust had been created for the payment of the debts out of the realty so as to prevent the operation of the statute of limitations; and that the real estate remained liable to pay a simple contract debt, which had been left unpaid after distribution of the residuary personal estate.

The cases of Fenwick v. Chapman, 9 Pet. Rep. 461; Peter v. Beverly, 10 Pet. Rep. 562; Bank of the U. S. v. Beverly, et al. 1 How. Rep. 134, we think are in harmony with the English decisions, and perhaps go quite as far in implying a trust for the payment of the testator’s debts, and in the consequences deduced from it. See also Lewis’s Ex’rs v. Bacon’s Legatee and Ex’r, 3 Hen. & M. Rep. 89.

In Hines v. Spruill, et al., 2 Dev. & Bat. Eq. 93, the testator by his will, gave to his two sisters all his land, together with all cattle, horses, and other appurtenances thereto, except so much thereof as will pay my just and lawful debts, which I think may be done from the crop now growing thereon.” He also gave to the same persons all his negroes : Held, that the will did not create a charge upon any part of the property for the benefit of creditors, beyond that [629]*629which the law imposes upon the testator’s estate; that if the words “ except so much thereof as will pay my debts, which I think may be done by my crop growing thereon,” create a charge, it is confined to the cattle, horses and other appurtenances mentioned in this clause.

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13 Ala. 611, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/carrington-co-v-mannings-heirs-ala-1848.