Nightingale and Another, Assignees v. Hidden and Others

7 R.I. 115
CourtSupreme Court of Rhode Island
DecidedMarch 6, 1862
StatusPublished

This text of 7 R.I. 115 (Nightingale and Another, Assignees v. Hidden and Others) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Rhode Island primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Nightingale and Another, Assignees v. Hidden and Others, 7 R.I. 115 (R.I. 1862).

Opinions

There is no question but that the plaintiffs are seized in fee, and in trust, of the homestead estate, situate on North Main street, subject only to the mortgage executed by the defendant, Zachariah Allen, to the defendant, Ely, in trust for Mrs. Allen. It is not denied, that the purpose and intent of this mortgage was, to indemnify Mrs. Allen against loss, and protect her interest in the Westminster street estate, from the payment of a mortgage executed by her husband and herself upon that estate, to secure the payment of the sum of fifteen thousand dollars to the defendant, Henry A. Hidden.

The plaintiffs claim that the said Zachariah, upon his marriage with his present wife, who, when sole, was Eliza Harriet Arnold, and the birth of issue of that marriage, became seized of an estate for his life in the Westminster street property, which estate vested in the plaintiffs by the deed of assignment of the said Allen to them, dated September 30th, 1858. The homestead estate has been advertised for sale, under the power of sale contained in the trust mortgage. The defendants deny that said *Page 118 Zachariah ever acquired any interest in the Westminster street property. The plaintiffs pray that they may be instructed as to their title as trustees in that estate; that they may be allowed to redeem the mortgage thereon, and that the sale of the homestead may be enjoined. Whether the said Zachariah had, at the time of the assignment to the plaintiff, an estate for life, as the plaintiffs claim, in the Westminster street property, depends upon the effect of the deed set forth in the bill, as executed by one Joseph J. Fenner to Samuel G. Arnold, bearing date July 16th, 1816.

The deed, by the premises, purports to grant, sell, and convey the Westminster street property to the said Samuel G. Arnold, his heirs and assigns forever, giving him an absolute fee simple therein; and by the habendum, — an use merely, as the plaintiffs claim, — a trust, as the defendants claim, — is limited therein, which is expressed in the deed by the words, "and to and for the only proper use, benefit and behoof of the said Eliza Harriet Arnold, her heirs and assigns forever;" so that her estate, as created by the deed, whether it be an use or a trust, is also in fee simple. If held to be a mere use, which might be executed by the statute of uses, she would, by force of the statute, become seized of a legal estate in fee simple in the premises.

The rules stated in the argument, as to the office and effect upon the conveyance of the habendum in a deed, are, in their proper application, undoubtedly true; that it cannot divest the grantee, of the legal estate already granted him in the premises, — and where by the premises the estate is granted to one, it cannot by the habendum be limited to another, — nor can thehabendum frustrate a grant complete before, or abridge, or lessen the estate granted. All this is true of the legal estate. But the deed here does not profess to affect the legal estate, already granted in the premises, or to grant any legal estate to any other person than to the grantee named, or to divest him of any estate already given; nor is there anything in thehabendum, so far as the legal estate is concerned, repugnant to, or inconsistent with the premises of the deed. The office of the habendum may, however, be, to declare to what use the grantee shall hold the estate granted him. Shep. Touchst. 75; Cruise, tit. xi. ch. 2, § 30; tit. xxxii. ch. 2; tit. xi. ch. 3, § 24; Durant v. Ritchie, 4 Mason, 45. All the cases cited by the defendants assume this. *Page 119

It is not necessary, it is true, that the declaration of uses should be made in the instrument conveying the estate. The uses might be declared by the grantee by any other proper instrument, with the same effect as if stated in the deed. The effect, in either case, was, that the legal estate still remained in the grantee named, and his heirs, while the person to whose use he held, though he had no legal estate, and was not regarded at law as having any interest in the land, was, nevertheless, clothed with the whole beneficial interest, and by the aid of a court of equity might take the entire profits of the estate, as if he were seized in fact of the land itself. It was because the limitation of the use did not transfer the estate to the cestui que use, while all the interest which was of any value was in him protected from forfeiture, from liability for his debts, not subject to dower, or curtesy, or other duties or burdens incident to a legal estate, that the statute, 27, Hen. 8, was enacted. In order to destroy this double estate, and to subject the use to the rules of the common law, the statute, where the person seized had no duty to perform, reduced it to a legal estate. This, the statute effected, by declaring that the estate of the grantee to use should be transferred to the person to whom the use was limited, and not by destroying the form of the conveyance. The statute contemplated that the use should be limited, as before, to one person upon the seizin of another, and provided, that whenever it was so limited, the seizin should immediately thereupon be transferred to the use. 4 Kent's Com. 299;Thatcher v. Omans, 3 Pick. 521; Durant v. Ritchie, 4 Mason, 45.

The question then recurs, is the limitation in this deed, created by the habendum upon the legal estate, an use which the statute will execute, or is it a trust, requiring the legal estate to remain in the grantee for the sole and separate use of the cestui, Eliza Harriet Arnold? If the latter, the legal estate must remain in the grantee in order to fulfill the trust, and prevent the interference of her husband; if the former, then the legal estate passed to the said Eliza, and became annexed to the use, and subject to the curtesy.

The words of limitation are, "to the only proper use, benefit, and behoof of the said Eliza Harriet Arnold, her heirs and assigns *Page 120 forever;" and it is said, that these words do not create an executed use, and that we are to presume the intent to have been, to engraft a trust on the legal estate. There is no reason, however, for presuming from the mere fact that the words are used in the habendum only, and not in the premises, that they were used with the intent to limit a trust, rather than a use, since the limitation of either is equally within the office of thehabendum; but whether it be the one, or the other, depends upon the intent of the parties, to be gathered from the language of the instrument itself. No particular form of words is necessary to create a trust of the nature here claimed, to the separate use of a married woman. It may be declared in express terms, or the intention may be manifested by provisions or directions as to the mode of enjoyment of the property. Hill on Trustees, p. 419; 1 Cruise Dig. 346. But in order to deprive the husband of his marital rights, the intention to create such an estate must be clearly and unequivocally expressed. Ib.

In Hill on Trustees, it is said, that "in modern times the judges have required much more stringent expressions for this purpose than were once considered sufficient." In Tyler v.Lake, 2 Russ. and Mylne, 183, it was said, that the expressions should be such "as to leave no doubt of the intention, and forbid the court to speculate on what the probable object of the donor might have been;" and referring to the case of Stanton v.Hall, 2 Russ.

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Related

Durant v. Ritchie
8 F. Cas. 118 (U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Massachusetts, 1825)

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Bluebook (online)
7 R.I. 115, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/nightingale-and-another-assignees-v-hidden-and-others-ri-1862.