In re the Construction of the Will of Rosenthal

283 A.D. 316, 127 N.Y.S.2d 778, 1954 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 4672
CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
DecidedFebruary 16, 1954
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 283 A.D. 316 (In re the Construction of the Will of Rosenthal) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In re the Construction of the Will of Rosenthal, 283 A.D. 316, 127 N.Y.S.2d 778, 1954 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 4672 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1954).

Opinions

Botein, J.

Petitioner appeals from a decree of the Surrogate construing the will of her great-grandfather.

That will divided the residue of the testator’s estate into two equal parts, each to be held in trust for a term measured by two lives. It granted to petitioner’s father (testator’s grandson) the power to appoint by his own will the corpus of one of these trusts. In turn, by his will petitioner’s father appointed the entire principal of the trust to petitioner. The donor of this power of appointment died in 1938 and the donee in 1952. Petitioner’s interest in the principal of the trust has not vested, as the remaining life tenant is alive.

The construction sought is whether petitioner would forfeit her right to take under the appointment were she, contrary to a provision in the donor’s will, to marry someone 1 ‘ who was not born in the Jewish faith and who shall not be of Jewish blood ”. She contemplates marrying a man named Kelley — concededly not of the Jewish faith. The learned Surrogate has ruled that if she marries outside the Jewish faith, she will forfeit her right to take as an appointee under her father’s will.

There can be no doubt that the donor held strong views about intermarriage and that these views found expression in sweeping strictures prohibiting certain offending descendants or their spouses from taking under his will. The pertinent provisions of the will which, it is claimed, must disqualify petitioner should she marry Kelley, are found in Article Twelfth, and read as follows:

‘ ‘ Twelfth: Anything herein contained to the contrary notwithstanding, all legacies and devises and all powers of appointment or disposition under this my Last Will and Testament, given, devised and bequeathed to any child of mine or to any descendant of mine, are given, devised and bequeathed subject to the following express condition, that is to say: In case any child or descendant of mine shall at the time of my death be married or shall thereafter marry, and the spouse of such child [319]*319or descendant of mine shall be a person who was not born in the Jewish faith and who shall not be of Jewish blood, then upon my death if such marriage shall have occurred prior thereto, or if such marriage shall occur after my death then upon such marriage, all legacies and devises whether of income or of principal to such child or descendant of mine so marrying, and all powers of appointment or of disposition given, devised and bequeathed to such child or descendant of mine so marrying, shall be cancelled, annulled and revoked and such legacies and/or devises whether of principal or income shall upon my death if such marriage shall occur prior to my death, or upon such marriage if such marriage shall have occurred after my death, be disposed of as though such child or descendant of mine had died before me if such marriage shall have occurred prior to my death, or had died at the time of such marriage if such marriage shall occur after my death, without power to appoint or dispose of any of the income or principal of my estate ”.

It will be noted that the donor cancelled all legacies, devises and powers of appointment given to his descendants who married outside the Jewish faith; but conspicuously absent, when compared with other directions in this long and carefully drawn will, is any disqualification of appointees, such as petitioner. The above-quoted portion of the will contains the only provisions which it is claimed expressly proscribe petitioner from taking by appointment. Concededly petitioner’s father never forfeited his power of appointment.

The first contention of respondent trustees, it would appear, is that as matter of law the petitioner-appointee is a legatee or devisee and therefore expressly disqualified by the above-quoted provisions of the will.

It is true that in far different settings interests passing by testamentary appointment have been endowed with the characteristics of estates created by the original will, or for reasons of public policy have been held to be tantamount to such estates. Thus, there is no doubt that the donee was the agent of the donor to effectuate the latter’s testamentary purposes and to that end we must read both their wills as one instrument (Matter of Walbridge, 178 Misc. 32, 37). Also, in exercising his power of appointment the donee was disposing of the donor’s property, and it remains the donor’s property, until vested in someone else (Matter of Harbeck, 161 N. Y. 211; Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co. v. Mortimer, 219 N. Y. 290).

These propositions find expression in those cases which enunciate the principle that for the purpose of ascertaining [320]*320whether the Rule against Perpetuities has been violated, interests resulting from the exercise of a power of appointment will be measured from the date of creation of said power of appointment (Genet v. Hunt, 113 N. Y. 158; Fargo v. Squiers, 154 N. Y. 250; Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co. v. Kip, 192 N. Y. 266; Guaranty Trust Co. v. Halsted, 245 N. Y. 447). When a testator adopts the device of giving the second life in being the power further to tie up the estate, the courts have held that the estate thus created through exercise of the power of appointment should be treated as if it were an estate created by the original testator. However, it is one thing to implement public policy and develop a liaison between donor and donee based upon the premise that the donee is disposing of the donor’s property. That premise is clearly valid, but has no bearing on the construction problem posed here. The fiction of “ relation back” cannot be stretched to constitute authority for the proposition that in this proceeding petitioner’s interest through appointment must be adjudged a legacy or devise.

Therefore, we cannot find that the clearly expressed purpose of the donor to exclude any of his descendants who should marry a non-Jew from taking by legacy or devise, or from exercising a power of appointment under his will necessarily disqualifies this petitioner. We must, however, examine the entire will to determine whether it was an inadvertence in drafting the instrument that accounts for the failure expressly to include appointees among the disobedient descendants whom the donor desired to cut out of his will; or whether the donor intended the words “legacy” and “ devise” to embrace an appointment such as was made to petitioner. “ When the intention is ascertained, the mode of expression, or an inadvertent omission in some particular, should be subordinated to the intent without regard to technical objections if in harmony with the general scheme and purpose of the will. The primary effort should be to find the testatrix’s general scheme and carry her purpose into effect, to which even general rules of interpretation are subservient” (Williams v. Jones, 166 N. Y. 522, 533).

The high degree of skill and the painstaking care manifested in the drawing of this will are factors militating against a finding of an inadvertent omission. This was a long and comprehensive document, establishing two trusts, making many bequests, and purporting to dispose of well over $1,000,000. Wherever a similar provision was made for different persons or classes of persons, or where provision was made for the same [321]*321people from different trusts, the language employed was identical, to the commas.

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Related

Seidel v. Werner
81 Misc. 2d 220 (New York Supreme Court, 1975)
In re Will
186 N.E.2d 648 (Cuyahoga County Probate Court, 1962)
In re the Construction of the Will of Rosenthal
121 N.E.2d 539 (New York Court of Appeals, 1954)
In re the Estate of Barrett
206 Misc. 363 (New York Surrogate's Court, 1954)

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Bluebook (online)
283 A.D. 316, 127 N.Y.S.2d 778, 1954 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 4672, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-the-construction-of-the-will-of-rosenthal-nyappdiv-1954.