Furr v. Jordan

196 Ga. 862
CourtSupreme Court of Georgia
DecidedNovember 11, 1943
DocketNos. 14671, 14672
StatusPublished

This text of 196 Ga. 862 (Furr v. Jordan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Furr v. Jordan, 196 Ga. 862 (Ga. 1943).

Opinion

Duckworti-i, Justice.

The Code declares: “Courts of ordinary have authority to exercise original, exclusive, and general jurisdiction of the following subject-matters: Probate of wills.” § 24-1901(1). “The court of ordinary shall have exclusive jurisdiction over the probate of wills. The residence of testator at his death shall give jurisdiction to the ordinary of that county.” § 113-603. In Israel v. Wolf, 100 Ga. 339 (28 S. E. 109), it was ruled: “It being within the power of the ordinary of any county to compel the filing in his office of any paper purporting to be the last will and testament of a deceased person who at the time of his death resided in such county, and the court of ordinary having original and exclusive jurisdiction in the first instance of the probate of all wills, the superior .court in the exercise of its equity powers has no jurisdiction to enjoin the custodian of an alleged will from offering it for probate; nor to decree, for any reason, the cancellation of an alleged will upon which no action has ever been taken by the court of ordinary.” In the opinion it was said: “The remedy of the petitioner to have the question of the validity of the alleged will decided is adequate and complete in the court of ordinary. That is the only court that can in the first instance judicially determine whether or not any given paper is the true will of the person by whom it purports to have been executed as such. Jurisdiction in cases of fraud in the execution of wills is distinctly taken away by the code from courts of equity in this State. Civil Code, § 4024.” That section (now § 37-701) provides as follows: “In all cases of fraud (except fraud in the execution of a will) equity has concurrent jurisdiction with the law.” As was said in Benton v. Turk, 188 Ga. 710, 723 (4 S. E. 2d, 580): “The rule that equity seeks always to do complete justice will not bring into equitable jurisdiction matters over which another court has exclusive jurisdiction.” For other cases to the effect that the court of ordinary alone has jurisdiction in the first instance to determine as to the factum of a will, see Adams v. Johnson, 129 Ga. 611 (59 S. E. 269); Field v. Brantley, 139 Ga. 437 (77 S. E. 559); Turner v. Holbrook, 145 Ga. 603 (89 S. E. 700); Elliott v. Johnson, 178 Ga. 384 (173 S. E. 399). No construction of the will is here involved, the only effort made by the petitioners as a class being to [872]*872set aside the will on the ground that it was-fraudulently induced by the stepfather, James Mack Furr, at a time when the testatrix was lacking in testamentary capacity. Under the above authorities they are relegated to the court of ordinary, where they may have an administrator cum testamento annexo appointed in the place of the deceased nominated executor, and thus provide a proper defendant to contest the issue which would arise by the filing of a caveat to the will, the application to probate which is now pending in the court of ordinary. “The nominated executor and propounder of a will is a legal party on behalf of the legatees, to conduct the litigation involved in a caveat to the will, from the beginning to a final adjudication.” Lucas v. Lucas, 30 Ga. 191 (4) (76 Am. D. 642); Yeates v. Yeates, 162 Ga. 153 (2-a) (132 S. E. 768). The nominated executor under the will of Mrs. Cora Florine Furr having died, his successor, an administrator cum testamento annexo, would necessarily be the proper defendant in litigation involved in a caveat to the will, which if sustained would establish intestacy as to the property owned by Mrs. Furr at the time of her death. Thus would be accomplished all that is sought from the court of equity in the present proceeding as to setting aside the will to enable the children to inherit their proper share in the estate as heirs at law. It follows that the court erred in overruling the grounds of demurrer in the respects above discussed. Slade v. Street, 27 Ga. 1, 21, cited and relied on by the defendants in error as to the court of equity having concurrent jurisdiction with the court of ordinary to adjudicate the alleged invalidity of the yill, is not authority for holding that equity has jurisdiction here. In that case the court of ordinary sustained a caveat to an application to probate a will. Pending an appeal to the superior court the court-house of the county, together with all the papers in the cause, except perhaps the will, was burned. An administrator of the estate of an infant devisee under the will filed a petition in equity, alleging that the nominated'executor had for stated reasons desisted from prosecuting the appeal, and sought to have set aside, the judgment of the court of ordinary rejecting the paper offered as a will, and to establish a copy of the paper as a will, and to cause revocation of letters of administration granted after the caveat was sustained. It was held that the court of equity had no jurisdiction, that a copy of the alleged will could as well be estab[873]*873lished in the court of ordinary; and in respect to whether or not a court of equity could take jurisdiction equally with the court of ordinary in the matter of the probate of a will it was ruled: “If a court of equity has jurisdiction of any case of will probate, the case can be only one in which the probate is for some reason not attainable in the court of ordinary.” (Italics ours.) No other case cited by the defendants in error is authority for a court of equity to take jurisdiction of the matter of setting aside the alleged will of Mrs. Cora Florine Furr, under the allegations of the petition.

But it is urged, that, under the well-established rule that an action will not be dismissed if any portion of the petition sets forth a cause of action, the court of equity should retain jurisdiction of the claim of Howard T. Jordan, one of the petitioning children, that he is equitably entitled to the two described lots of land which James Mack Furr was obligated to deed to him as the equivalent of the balance of the sale price of certain realty which belonged to him and which proceeds had been retained by Furr, and should retain jurisdiction of the question of enforcing the contract which, as alleged, was entered into between him and Furr, whereby for services rendered Furr during his lifetime it was agreed that he would will all of his property to Howard T. Jordan. This leads to an inquiry whether or not a cause of action in these respects is set out in the petition against any of the defendants. The defendant Frank H. Jordan is shown to be temporary administrator of the estate of Cora Florine Furr. Certainly no relief is sought against him in respect to the claims above mentioned. Mrs. Mattie Sue Wilson, the second Mrs. James Mack Furr, occupies no position as a defendant except in her individual capacity. If, as to title to the two lots of land above mentioned or as to all of the property of James Mack Furr sought to be acquired by Howard T. Jordan for reason stated in the petition, a decree of the court of equity could operate so as to bind the estate of Furr, it is only upon Mrs. J. H. Dillard, the temporary administratrix of such estate. Is a cause of action set forth against her? By the Code, § 113-1207, it is declared that the ordinary may at any time grant temporary letters of administration upon any unrepresented estate, for the purpose of collecting and taking care of the effects of the deceased. “Effects” refers, of course, to personal property. Banks [874]*874v. Walker, 112 Ga.

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Bluebook (online)
196 Ga. 862, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/furr-v-jordan-ga-1943.