Fassitt v. Seip

95 A. 273, 249 Pa. 576, 6 A.L.R. 1671, 1915 Pa. LEXIS 768
CourtSupreme Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedMay 26, 1915
DocketAppeals, Nos. 62 and 67
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 95 A. 273 (Fassitt v. Seip) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Fassitt v. Seip, 95 A. 273, 249 Pa. 576, 6 A.L.R. 1671, 1915 Pa. LEXIS 768 (Pa. 1915).

Opinion

Opinion by

Mr. Justice Mestkezat,

This is a bill in equity filed May 1, 1913, by the plaintiff’s guardian for the partition of three pieces of real estate held by the plaintiff and the defendant as tenants in common, and for an accounting of the rents and profits of the property while in the occupancy of the defendant. The plaintiff became of age on Juñe 12, 1913.' A decree was entered in favor of the plaintiff January 26, 1915, from which both parties have taken an appeal. The appeals will be disposed of in oñe opinion. The' learned master made an exhaustive report in which he found the facts and stated his conclusions of law. His findings and report were confirmed by the court below. It would serve no good purpose to review at length either his findings of fact or his conclusions of law, so far as they relate to the defendant’s appeal, as we are all satisfied that it is- without merit save in the minor details hereinafter noticed.

The principal question in the defendant’s appeal is as to the validity of an alleged compromise or family settlement made by representatives of the plaintiff and the defendant by which they agreed to accept the provisions of the will and codicil of Mrs. Theresa Veile, [593]*593and that the income given to the child by the codicil to the will of Theresa Yeile should be paid to her by the defendant. It is claimed on the part of the defendant that this was a family agreement which was intended to protect the defendant and also the interests of Clarissa M. Yeile, the plaintiff, by giving her the income provided in the will of her grandmother. It is contended that the agreement was a compromise of possible litigation and accepted by all the parties in interest and that it bars the plaintiff from recovering from the defendant her share of the rental value of the property which was in the defendant’s occupancy from 1894 until 1913, when it was determined by this court that the title to the premises was in the plaintiff and defendant as tenants in common. The agreement in question is a writ: ing signed by Florence R. Veile for her daughter, Clarissa M. Veile, in which is recited a codicil to the will of Theresa Veile, the grandmother of the plaintiff and the mother of defendant, who claimed the property, by which the defendant was required to pay the plaintiff forty dollars per month, during the defendant’s lifetime, and which writing acknowledged the receipt of forty dollars, being the first monthly payment under the codicil, and declared “that I accept all the provisions contained and set forth in said last will and testament and codicil thereto.” This paper is dated May 7, 1894. At this time Clarissa Veile was not quite two years of age and the Easton Trust Company was her guardian. It is strenuously contended by the defendant, in an elabor: ate argument dealing with the testimony and the law, that this was a family settlement or compromise which is binding on the plaintiff, and deprives her of the right to recover her share of the rental value and income of the property from the date of the death of the life tenant, Mrs. Theresa Veile, until it was determined in 1913 by the decision of this court that the plaintiff was the owner of the undivided one-half interest in the property. We, however, entirely agree with the court below and [594]*594the learned master who found that “the acceptance by plaintiff’s mother during plaintiff’s minority of certain payments made to her by defendant pursuant to the terms of the will of Theresa Veile, and the acceptance by her (the mother) of the provisions contained in said will, which acceptance was ratified neither by the guardian nor by herself when she became of age, cannot be set up by defendant as a bar or defense to plaintiff’s claim in this proceeding.”

The facts are found and clearly stated by the learned master, and it does not appear that there were any other writings bearing on the question of the alleged settlement, or that the guardian of the plaintiff signed, ratified or approved it. The guardian was not present when the paper was executed by the mother of the child, was not consulted beforehand about it, and had no knowledge of it until the mother had signed it. It is unnecessary to discuss what took place between Mr. Scott and Mr. Cope, the attorneys alleged to have represented the interests of Mrs. Seip and the minor child and her mother, or the telephonic communication with Mr. James, the president of the Easton Trust Company, as the writing executed by the mother of the minor must be relied on to establish the family agreement. It is clear that she had no authority to bind her minor child or to make any agreement which would affect the latter’s rights in the real estate in question or the income or profits arising therefrom: Senser v. Bower, 1 P. & W. 450; Heft v. McGill, 3 Pa. 256, 263; Groome v. Belt, 171 Pa. 74. It must be assumed that the eminent counsel, acting for the parties in the transaction, were fully aware, not only of the interest of the minor in the property but also of the only legal way in which it could be affected or divested. The president of the Easton Trust Company, the guardian, was also a lawyer of high professional standing and, therefore, manifestly knew that the mother’s signature to the paper in question could not bind, her infant child. The guardian did not sign the [595]*595paper and thereby become á party to the alleged family settlement. It received none of the annual payments directed to be made by the will of Theresa Yeile. The annual installments were all paid to the mother and receipted for by her. In fact, Mrs. Seip and her counsel dealt entirely with the mother, to the exclusion of the guardian. Why the guardian did not act for its ward and execute the paper in question does not appear, but may be inferred from the fact that the alleged compromise was manifestly against the interests of its ward. • The guardian repudiated the alleged settlement by bringing the action of ejectment in 1912 and subsequently filing this bill for an accounting of the rents, income and profits of the property while it was in the possession and occupancy of the defendant. The learned counsel who acted for Mrs. Seip and for the child’s mother respectively and the president of the trust company knew that the guardian was the only party who could legally represent the child in effecting a settlement. There could be, therefore, no reasonable ground for the defendant’s belief that the paper in question was a valid legal family settlement which bound Clarissa Veile, the two year old child. Mrs. Seip could not have been misled as to the effect of the paper in view, of the fact that she was represented by such eminent counsel. In fact, the paper signed by the mother was not a release to Mrs. Seip, or anything but a receipt and a declaration that the mother, on behalf of her daughter, accepted all the provisions of Theresa Veile’s will and codicil. The only inference that can be drawn from the whole transaction is that Mrs. Seip was willing to deal with the mother of the child instead of the guardian, and that the latter did not intend to bind itself or its ward by the paper executed by the mother. A chancellor cannot make an agreement for parties nor enforce an agreement against one who is not a, party to it. We. think the learned master and court below were clearly right in their con[596]*596elusion as to the purpose and validity of the alleged agreement.

The rental value of the property during the defendant’s occupancy and the application of the statute of limitations raised on the defendant’s appeal are fully discussed by the learned master and require no further consideration here.

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Bluebook (online)
95 A. 273, 249 Pa. 576, 6 A.L.R. 1671, 1915 Pa. LEXIS 768, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/fassitt-v-seip-pa-1915.