Edwards v. Rainier's Ex'rs

17 Ohio St. (N.S.) 597
CourtOhio Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 15, 1867
StatusPublished

This text of 17 Ohio St. (N.S.) 597 (Edwards v. Rainier's Ex'rs) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Ohio Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Edwards v. Rainier's Ex'rs, 17 Ohio St. (N.S.) 597 (Ohio 1867).

Opinion

Day, C. J.

We are called upon, under this proceeding in error, to determine whether the court of common pleas correctly construed the will of Isaac Bainier, deceased. No bill of exceptions was taken in that court embodying the evidence there given, and so far as evidence was admissible to aid in the construction of the will, it may be presumed to have been before the court. At most, however, the evidence could only inform the court of all the circumstances that surrounded *the testator, to aid it in determining the meaning the testator intended should be given to the words he used in the will.

With this presumption in favor of the judgment below, we are left to construe the will by the language used therein, aided only, •on the principal question, by a fact conceded by the pleadings, that the testator, when he executed the will, had personal property sufficient to fill all the legacies upon the largest construction of the beouest.

[554]*554It is claimed by tbe executors that tbe sum of $1,000, to be paid by Mrs. Adell to Mrs. Edwards, is to be applied on the legacy to her of $1,500, and is not to be regarded as a legacy in addition to that sum.

Mrs. Edwards claims that it was the intention of the testator to give her both sums.

Here arises the principal question presented for our consideration : "Was the $1,000 intended by the testator to be an additional benefit or legacy to Mrs. Edwards ?

The books afford us but little aid in the solution of this question; for, in the language of Chief Justice Hornblower, in Jones v. Creveling, 4 Har. 127, “After a careful examination of the cases cited on the argument and of many others, I am satisfied, notwithstanding all the nice distinctions that have been taken by courts of law and courts of equity, upon the subject of single or cumulative legacies, we must come down to the plain commonsense question, -of what was the intention of the testator.”

Chief Justice Kent, after much research, arrived at substantially the same result, in DeWitt v. Yates, 10 Johns. 156. Although he recognizes the general rule, that, where the sum is repeated in the same writing, the presumption is against the legatee, and that where the two bequests are in different instruments the presumption is in his favor, he adds: “The presumption either way, whether against the cumulation, because the legacy is repeated in the same instrument, or whether in favor of it, because-the legacy is by different instrumente, is liable to bo controlled and repelled by internal evidence, and the circumstances of the case.”

The general rule is stated, in an English treatise, to be, that where two legacies are given by the same testamentary instrument *of equal amount, courts infer an intention in the testator to give but one legacy.; and that, “where the legacies given by the same testamentary instrument to the same person are of different amounts, the legacy shall be considered accumulative." Rop. Leg. *996, *998.

If the $1,000 was in the form of a direct bequest, these authorities might aid us in arriving at a conclusion; but the real question is, whether that sum was intended to be in part payment of a legacy already expressly given in the will; if not, the question is settled, for it is clear that the testator intended Mrs. Edwards should have the money. If he did not intend that it should apply in part pay[555]*555ment of the $1,500, it is equally clear that he intended it should be an additional legacy.

The only question then is, whether the testator intended that Mrs. Edwards should receive the sum of $1,000, to be paid to her as directed in the fifth item of the will, in part payment of the legacy he had given her in the third.

The intention of the testator in relation to this, “ is to be gathered from the phraseology of the will itself; and to arrive at this intention, it is necessary to look into the entire instrument.” Williams v. Veach, 17 Ohio, 180; Beckwith v. Moore, 14 Ohio St. 129; Brasher v. Marsh, 15 Ohio St. 103.

. Let us then look at the will. We search in vain for any expression of a purpose that the $1,000 should be applied in part satisfaction of the legacy bequeathed in the third item of the will. There is no language used in the instrument from which such an intention can fairly be implied. It would have been most natural, in a matter of so much importance, to have indicated that the $1,000 was to be paid to Mrs. Edwards, to apply on the legacy before given to her, if such was the intention of the testator. If he intended to make the mode of paying this legacy of $1,500 to differ so widely from that of paying all the other legacies in his will, it is singular that he did not add to the gift of “ fifteen hundred dollars in cash,” some words indicating such a purpose, or else have done so in connection with the direction that $1,000 should be paid to the legatee of the $1,500. This strikes us' with the more surprise, if such was his intention, since, in other parts *of his will, in matters of less importance, he is sufficiently explicit. Where he directs two of his legatees to pay money to his widow, in the contingency of her marriage, he specifies that it shall be “in lieu” of her interest in his real estate. In the second item, he gives his wife all the household and kitchen furniture, except what is “ hereafter willed;” she is also to have such books as she may select, except those hereafter willed;” and in the sixth clause, he devises land subject to the widow’s dower “above .written.” While thus explicit in minor matters, if such was his purpose, he would naturally have added to the legacy of $1,500, or to the requirement to pay the legatee of that amount the sum of $1,000, some words indicating a purpose to have the latter sum applied on the former.

Nor was it at all singular, as contended in argument, that the tes [556]*556tator did not embrace in the third item all he intended to give his daughter, Mrs. Edwards, but left a part to be inserted in the fifth.

After providing for his wife in the second clause, it would seem •that he makes a further provision for her in the fifth, in relation to the real estate; clearly, in the sixth, he gives her some property in addition to that bequeathed to her in the second. Moreover, there .are obvious reasons, if he did intend to give the $1,000 in addition to the $1,500, why he should insert that gift in the clause we find it, .and no particular reason why both gifts should be inserted in one item of the will. One was a general legacy; the other was to be paid by a particular person, and at particular times, and is in a clause naming the person to pay it, and providing the means of securing payment. It would have been more certain, doubtless, if the testator had added, in the fifth item, for what purpose he directed the sum of $1,000 to be paid to Mrs. Edwards, whether as payment on the legacy already given to her, or in addition thereto. He did, however, take care to express a purpose that the money should be paid by Mrs. Adell to Mrs. Edwards; and there he leaves it, in her hands, without any intimation but that he intended it should be fully and unconditionally her property; certainly there is no ^intimation that he intended it to diminish the amount of the legacy before given to her.

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Related

Dewitt v. Yates
10 Johns. 156 (New York Supreme Court, 1813)

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Bluebook (online)
17 Ohio St. (N.S.) 597, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/edwards-v-rainiers-exrs-ohio-1867.