Esterly v. Rua

122 F. 609, 58 C.C.A. 548, 2 Alaska Fed. 96, 1903 U.S. App. LEXIS 3911
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
DecidedMay 14, 1903
DocketNo. 907
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 122 F. 609 (Esterly v. Rua) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Esterly v. Rua, 122 F. 609, 58 C.C.A. 548, 2 Alaska Fed. 96, 1903 U.S. App. LEXIS 3911 (9th Cir. 1903).

Opinion

GILBERT, Circuit Judge,

after stating the case as above, delivered the opinion of the court.

On the presentation of the appeal before this court, it is contended that the judgment should be reversed for the following reasons: (1) The claim presented to the administrator was not properly verified; (2) the heirs of the decedent were not made parties; (3) the claim presented to the District Court was different from that presented to the administrator; (4) the court had no jurisdiction of the subject-matter; (5) the court erred in denying the appellant a jury trial.

The first three grounds on which the judgment is now attacked are not included in the assignments of error. The assignments of error, it is true, charge that the court erred in overruling the motion of the administrator to strike out the petition, in overruling his demurrer thereto, in overruling his motion for a judgment on the pleadings, and in overruling his written objections to the introduction of any testimony; but that is all that is said in the assignments concerning those motions and the demurrer. There is no specification of the grounds of the motions or of the demurrer, and those grounds cannot be ascertained without searching the record. This the court will not do where the objections are, as they are in this case, purely technical, such as that the claim before the administrator was not duly verified, or that it differed from the claim presented to the court, or that the heirs have not been made parties to the proceeding. Grape Creek Coal Co. v. Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co., 12 C.C.A. 350, 63 F. 891; Atchison, T. & S. F. R. Co. v. Mulligan, 14 C.C.A. 547, 67 F. 569.

It is contended that the court had no jurisdiction of said estate for the purpose of hearing or determining the claim, [100]*100for the reason that the alleged partnership between the appellee and the decedent had never been settled, and could only be settled by a suit in equity. It is true that in the most of the states the jurisdiction of probate courts over the estates of decedents does not divest courts of equity of jurisdiction over suits to settle partnership affairs, and that, ordinarily probate courts have no such jurisdiction. But there are states in which the reverse is true. Alaska Code, tit. 2, § 823, after enacting that if the executor or administrator shall refuse to allow a claim or a demand against the deceased it may be presented to the District Court or the judge thereof for allowance, thus provides: “The District Court, or the judge thereof, shall have power to hear and determine in a summary manner all demands against any estate agreeable to the provisions of this chapter, and which have been so rejected by the executor or administrator; and shall cause a concise entry of the order of allowance or rejection to be made on the record, which order shall have the force and effect of a judgment from which an appeal may be taken as in ordinary cases.” Act June 6, 1900, c. 786 (31 Stat. 462).

Section 790 provides: “The executor or administrator of a deceased person who was a member of a copartnership, shall include in the inventory of such person’s estate in a separate schedule the whole property of such partnership.” Act June 6, 1900, c. 786 (31 Stat. 457).

Section 791 provides: “After the inventory is taken the partnership property shall be in the custody and control of the executor or administrator for the purpose of administration, unless the surviving partner shall, within five days from the filing of the inventory, or such further time as the commissioner may allow, apply for the administration thereof, and give the undertaking therefor hereinafter prescribed.” Act June 6, 1900, c. 786 (31 Stat. 457).

Section 792 provides that if the surviving partner become such administrator he shall be denominated an administrator of the partnership, “and his powers and duties extend to the settlement of the partnership business generally.” Section 794 provides: “In case the surviving partner is not appointed administrator of the partnership, the administration thereof devolves upon the executor or [101]*101general administrator.” Act June 6, 1900, c. 786 (31 Stat. 458). Section 795, “Respecting the Administration of Estates,” provides: “The mode of proceeding is in the nature of a suit in equity as distinct from an action at law.” Act June 6, 1900, c. 786 (31 Stat. 458).

The language of section 823, above quoted, is identical with that of section 1134 of the Code of Civil Procedure of Oregon, the laws of which state had been extended over Alaska, and were in force in that territory up to the time of the adoption of the Code of Alaska. In Pomeroy’s Equity Jurisprudence, § 1154, Oregon is placed in the rank of the few states in which “the jurisdiction of the probate courts over everything pertaining to the regular administration and settlement of decedent’s estates is virtually exclusive.” In a note to the same section (page 115) it is said that in Oregon “the absence of decisions upon the general question indicates that the statutory system of probate jurisdiction is exclusive, and that there is practically no equitable jurisdiction.” In Winkle v. Winkle, 8 Or. 193, it was held that, where there was an antenuptial agreement made by the deceased, the rights of the parties claiming under it cannot be determined in equity, but should be presented'and proved in the regular course of the administration pending in the probate court, and determined by that court in the final settlement. The court said that the statute had conferred on the probate court “exclusive jurisdiction in all matters pertaining to the transfer of the title to personal property of deceased persons. A court of equity has no jurisdiction over it.”

Missouri and Maine are states in which, as in Oregon, the jurisdiction of probate courts over claims against estates is practically exclusive. In Ensworth v. Curd, Adm’r, 68 Mo. 382, a suit in equity had been instituted in the circuit court by a petition which alleged that Jhe plaintiff and the administrator’s intestate were, in the lifetime of the latter, engaged as partners in the purchase and sale of real estate, and the plaintiff prayed for an adjustment of their accounts, and that certain real property to which the intestate had taken a deed in his own name, and of which he died seised, be declared partnership property, and subjected to the payment of any balance found due the plaintiff on the [102]*102final settlement of their accounts. It was held that while a court possessed of general equity powers is undoubtedly the proper tribunal in which to settle copartnership affairs between the living, settlement of a copartnership that had been dissolved by the death of one of the partners must be had in the probate court, and the plaintiff was relegated to that court. See Pearce v. Calhoun, 59 Mo. 271; Ross v. Carson, 32 Mo.App. 148; State ex rel. Richardson v. Withrow et al., 141 Mo. 85, 41 S.W. 980; Cook v. Lewis, 36 Me. 340. These considerations and the foregoing authorities fully dispose of the objection to the jurisdiction of the District Court as a court of probate over the appellee’s claim. But if, indeed, the appellee were, under the Code of Alaska, required to resort to a court of equity to establish the fact of the copartnership and his claim against it, the proceedings which were had in the District Court would fully answer the requirements of such a suit. The petition of the appellee contained all the necessary averments of a bill in equity. The court had jurisdiction of such a suit.

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Bluebook (online)
122 F. 609, 58 C.C.A. 548, 2 Alaska Fed. 96, 1903 U.S. App. LEXIS 3911, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/esterly-v-rua-ca9-1903.