Collier v. Collier's

3 Ohio St. (N.S.) 369
Ohio Supreme Court·Decided December 15, 1854·Published

Opinion

Ranney, J.

This case requires a construction of the will and two codicils thereto of James Collier, late of Greene county, deceased. The complainant is his widow, and the defendants his executors and legatees. -

The will was executed on the 15th day of February, a. d. 1845 and with the exception of a house and lot in Bellefontaine, which was devised absolutely to the complainant, it directed the executors to sell and convert into money all his real and personal property; 370] the one-third of which, after ^paying his debts, etc., ho gave to the complainant “ in her own right, to her and her heirs forever, and to sell and dispose of, or use for her own benefit, in lieu of dower and all other claims on my estate.” The remaining two-thirds he divided equally between his brother, Moses Collier, and the children of his sister, Agnes Park, then deceased. Among the property then owned, or subsequently acquired by him, were several town lots situated in the town of Xenia, and about four thousand dollars of stock in the branch bank of that place, and in the Columbus and Xenia Railroad Company. On the 1st day of April, 1851, he executed the first codicil, in which, after reciting that he had by his will directed all his real property to be sold, he says: “It is now my desire, and my said executors are directed, to except from said sale the property wherein I now reside, which I wish reserved for the use and benefit of my beloved wife, Rachel Collier, during her natural life; and my said executors are herebj^ directed to sell, of the property lying west of Detroit street, in Xenia, so much of the' ground only as lies west of a line drawn from the alley between Galloway and Crumbaugh’s lots north to Market street, so as to leave all east of said line to be sold at the decease of my said wife.”

In relation to the bank and railroad stocks, this codicil provides: “It is also my desire, and my said executors are hereby accordingly directed, to reserve from sale my bank and railroad stock, and pay out the dividends which may come to their hands for distribution, to my heirs, so soon as thoy may receive such dividends.”

On the fifth of the same month, and shortly before his death, he executed the second codicil, in which he gives and bequeaths to his [371, 372]*371, 372wife, during her natural life, a piece of ground near the town, then used as a pasture-lot. The testator died without children, leaving the complainant, his widow, and his brother Moses, and the children of his sister Agnes, his only heirs at law. The appraisers of the personal property belonging to his estate-set off to the widow, under the statute, property to the value of $524, for her year’s ^support, and within the time allowed by law, she duly elected [371 to take under the will.

The house that the testator occupied at the time the first codicil was made is situated on lot No. 59, which lies on the westerly limit of the land reserved from sale. He also owned a part of lot 60, which lies between lot 59 and Detroit street. We have no difficulty in holding the complainant entitled to the use of both these lots during her life. There is nothing in the will to indicate an intention to confine her to the lot on which the house stood. She is to have the property whereon the testator then resided; and he clearly indicated wbat he regarded as such by withholding from sale all east of the designated line until her death. It is equally clear that when that event happened, he expected'this part of the property' would then be sold, in accordance with the directions given in his will. He intended to postpone the sale until that time, but not to revoke the previous authority given his executors when that event should happen. His language is too explicit to admit of doubt. The reservation is to operate “ so as to leave all east of said line to be sold at the decease of my said wife.”

The questions presented by the parties are:

1. To whom will the proceeds arising from the sale of these lands, at the death of the wife, belong?

2. Who is entitled to the bank and railroad stocks? And,

3. Is the widow entitled to retain, without account, the property set off for her year’s support ?

The intention of the testator, derived from a careful consideration of what he has committed to writing in the will and codicil, must answer the two first questions, and our statute law the last.

I. On the part of the complainant, it is claimed that she has a present vested interest in one-third of the proceeds of these .lands, which she may dispose of by sale or -last will and testament; and if not.so disposed of, that it would, upon her death, go to her heirs; that she is entitled to the whole *of the stocks as the [372 “ heir ” of her husband, who left no children; and that she has not [373]*373relinquished her right to a year’s support by electing to take under the will.

■ These claims are all resisted by the defendants, who, on their part, insist that the provisions of the codicil are entirely inconsistent with the bequest of one-third of the proceeds of these lands to the widow by the will, and must be held to have revoked it; and, as a consequence, that the lands or their proceeds, at her death, descend or are distributed to Moses and the children of Agnes, as the lawful and only heirs of the testator; that, because they are such heirs, they are the persons designated in the codicil as entitled to all the stocks; and that the complainant, by electing to take under the will, relinquished all claims upon the estate not provided for in it, and consequently all claim for a year’s support

In endeavoring to elicit the intention of the testator, the will and codicils must be read- and considered together. Negley v. Gard, 20 Ohio, 315. Chancellor Kent, in Westcott v. Cady, 5 Johns. Ch. 343, lays it down “ asaclearand settled rule, that awill and codicil are to be taken and construed together, in connection with each other, as parts of one and the same instrument; ” and that “ the intent of the testator is to be gathered from the whole, and a codicil is no revocation of a will, further than it is expressed.” This results from the very nature and office of a codicil, which is made to be added to the will, to enlarge, restrict, or modify some of its provisions, and not, like a later will, to stand in -the place of, or supersede it.

The will, in this case, is clear and explicit. It gives the executors full power to sell and convert into money, all his real and personal property, except such of the personal property as the widow chooses to take at the appraisement. It then bequeathes to her absolutely one-third of the proceeds “in her own right, to her and her heirs forever.”

Now, if the substance of these codicils had been added to the will at the time it was made (and they must be construed as 373] though they had been), they could have been *held to restrict its provisions no further than to postpone the sale of some portion of the real estate until the death of the widow, and in the meantime to secure the enjoyment of it to her. There is not one word used that indicates an intention to deprive her of one-third of the property, so explicitly conferred by the will. Nor can we see any reason, consistently with the testator’s declared intention, [374]*374that there should have been. His "wife was then over seventy-years of age.

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Collier v. Collier's, 3 Ohio St. (N.S.) 369 (Ohio 1854).

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