Cumberland & Liberty Mills v. Keggin

190 So. 492, 139 Fla. 133
CourtSupreme Court of Florida
DecidedJuly 7, 1939
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 190 So. 492 (Cumberland & Liberty Mills v. Keggin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Cumberland & Liberty Mills v. Keggin, 190 So. 492, 139 Fla. 133 (Fla. 1939).

Opinion

Whitfield, P. J.

In February, 1937, appellee here brought suit in the Circuit Court for Hillsborough County, Florida, against the appellants, seeking to enjoin the sale of real estate as the property of James W. Keggin, deceased under an execution issued in 1936 on a judgment obtained against James W. Keggin in 1923 when he was a widower and his only two children, adult sons, were living with him, some of such property being claimed as the homestead of James W. Keggin, who died in 1935.

In the administration of the estate of James W. Keggin, no claim was presented under the judgment obtained against James W. Keggin in 1923. It is alleged that the judgment against James W. Keggin was not for any indebtedness for which the exempted homestead real estate may be made liable under the Constitution. The Court granted the injunction, and the defendants appealed.

The first question presented is:

“Does property alleged to be homestead constitute such a status under the Constitution of the State of Florida, where the judgment debtor was a widower at the time of the rendition of tire judgment and the only persons residing with the said judgment debtor upon said property were his two sons, both of whom had reached their majority?”

The Constitution of Florida contains the following:

“A homestead to the extent of one hundred and sixty acres of land, or the half of one acre within the limits of any incorporated city or town, owned by the head of a family residing in this State, together with one thousand dollars’ worth of personal property, and the improvements on the real estate, shall be exempt from forced sale under process of any court, and the real estate shall not be alienable without the joint consent of husband and wife, when that relation exists. But no -property shall be exempt from sale *135 for taxes or assessments, or for the payment of obligations contracted for the purchase of said property, or for the erection or repair of improvements on the real estate exempted, or for house, field or other labor performed on the same. The exemption herein provided for in' a city or town shall not extend to more improvements or buildings than the residence and business house of the owner; and no judgment or decree or exection' shall be a lien upon exempted proprty except as provided in this article.” Sec. 1, Art. X.
■ “The exemptions provided for in Section 1 shall inure to the widow and heirs of the party entitled to such exemption, and shall apply to all debts, except as specified in said section.” Sec. 2, Art. X.

The property claimed as a homestead of james W. Keg-gin' at his death consists of Lots 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 of Block 52 of Macfarlane Park in -Hillsborough County, Florida, the lots aggregating in area less than on-half acre. Lot 3 was owned by James W. Keggin while his wife was living. After the death of his wife, but while his son, Thomas G. Keggin and his family continued to .live on the homestead with the father, James W. Keggin, acquired, in 1925, Lots 1 and 2, and, in 1929, Lots 4 and 5. Thomas G. Keggin married in 1925 and brought his wife to live with him and his father on the father’s homestead. The other son, B. M. Keggin, moved from the homestead at that time.

James W. Keggin owned homestead real estate on which he, with his wife and two sons, Thomas G. Keggin and B. M. Keggin, lived. After the death of the wife, the sons, being then of age, continued to live with the father on the homestead. One of the sons, Thomas G. Keggin, married and thereafter with his family lived with the father on the homestead, %and said son and his family continued to live on the homestead after the father died, the other son having moved from the father’s homestead when his brother married. *136 After the death of the father the unmarried son who had moved from the homestead, conveyed the homestead to his brother, who with his family continued to live on the homestead. The two sons were the only heirs of the father.

The homestead exemption inures to the heirs where there is no widow; and the married son', one of the two heirs of the father, lived with the father on his homestead at and after the death of the mother, and until the death of the father; and continued to live on .the homestead with his family after the death of the father. Under such circumstances, in the absence of a showing that the father and the married son did not regard the son and his family, while they lived on the father’s homstead with him, as being of the family of 'the father, such continued living together of the father and his son and heir and the son’s family after the death of the mother, will.be regarded as constituting a continuing family relation which preserved the homestead character of the real estate, so that at the father’s death such homestead inured to the two sons under the Constitution, exempt from debts of the father, except those debts, if any, which are specified in the Constitution as not being subject to homestead exemption.

The provision of Section 2, Article X, of the Constitution that the homestead exemptions “shall inure to the widow and heirs of the party entitled to such exemption, and shall apply to all debts, except as specified in” Section 1, does not limit the exemption to the “heirs” who are minors or dependents; but such exempt property “inures to the * * * heirs of the” father where the mother predeceased the father.

In Whiddon v. Abbott, 124 Fla. 293, 168 So. 253, when the wife died the husban'd was left alone in the home.. Several years thereafter a son of the couple who had for years lived elsewhere, returned to live in the home with the father, but it did not appear that a family relation had been re *137 established between the father and his son and the son’s family.

In Dania Bank v. Wilson & Toomer Fert. Co., 127 Fla. 45, 172 So. 476, the homestead character of the property was not clearly established before, the death of the wife, and the son and his family who had lived on the homestead moved to another State and resided there for several years and upon his return with his family to his father’s home at the father’s request, his subsequent living- with his family in the father’s home did not appear to have been the reestablishment of a family relation between the father and the son and his family after the latter returned from residence in another State for several years.

In this case there was until the death of the homestead owner, a continuity in family relationship of two or more persons living on the homestead, such persons being among those who are entitled to the homestead exemptions under Sections 1 and 2, Article X of the Constitution. See Constitution of Florida, Annotated, Supp. of 1936.

The second question presented is:

“Does the failure to file a proof of claim by a judgment creditor in the probate of the estate of its judgment debtor bar its right following the 'administration of said estate to levy upon property upon which its judgment attached and became a lien at the time of its rendition'?”

The statutes of Florida contain the following:

“Section 120.

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Bluebook (online)
190 So. 492, 139 Fla. 133, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/cumberland-liberty-mills-v-keggin-fla-1939.