Shackleton v. Food Machinery & Chemical Corp.

166 F. Supp. 636, 1958 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3586
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Illinois
DecidedSeptember 4, 1958
DocketCiv. A. No. 942-D
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 166 F. Supp. 636 (Shackleton v. Food Machinery & Chemical Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Shackleton v. Food Machinery & Chemical Corp., 166 F. Supp. 636, 1958 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3586 (illinoised 1958).

Opinion

PLATT, Chief Judge.

Plaintiff, Dorothy Sells Landsheft Shackelton, a citizen of Michigan, filed suit to enforce the provisions of Clause 6 of a written contract executed October 26, 1928, between her brothers, Ogden, Millar and Neal Sells, and John Bean Manufacturing Company, predecessor of defendant, Food Machinery and Chemical Corporation, an organization incorporated in Delaware. By the language of the contract the Sells brothers obligated themselves individually to transfer all the outstanding shares of SpragueSells, a family corporation, in consideration of $224,985, 2,778 shares of fully paid no par common stock of John Bean Company, and a provision for employment of Sells brothers upon specified terms. The First Trust and Savings Bank of Chicago, Illinois, was nominated escrowee. Clause 6 recites:

“In addition to such purchase price The Bean Company agrees to pay Mrs. Lottie Sells, the mother of the Individuals, a royalty of $25 for each corn-husking machine sold by it or any of its subsidiaries during her life. Upon her death like royalties on sales of such machines thereafter shall be paid to her daughter, Dorothy S. Landsheft, provided she shall not have theretofore remarried; such royalties to be paid to her until her death or remarriage.”

From the pleadings, affidavits and depositions the following facts appear. Ogden Sells negotiated the contract on behalf of his brothers and managed to secure Clause 6 as a part of the consideration. At the time the contract was made in 1928, plaintiff was 30 years of age and living with her mother. Though she had been informed of the provisions of the contract after it was executed, she nevertheless remarried in 1944, one year prior to the death of her mother. The defendant’s Sprague-Sells Division, located at Hoopeston, Illinois, manufactures nearly all of the defendant’s corn-huskers, and it was this Division which paid to Lottie Sells, the royalties accruing during her lifetime. Upon these essential facts there is no dispute, and both parties have presented a motion for summary judgment.

Plaintiff maintains that the conditions of Clause 6 restraining her remarriage are in violation of public policy, and that the court should strike them and leave the agreement to pay royalties in force. Since there is no provision for the payment of royalties to another should she remarry, plaintiff further contends that the conditions of Clause 6 violate the “in terrorem” rule and are therefore void upon this additional ground. Defendant on the other hand contends that Clause 6 embodies a condition precedent that plaintiff shall not have remarried prior to the death of her mother, and a condition subsequent or limitation which alone recites whatever provision may be in total restraint of marriage. Since plaintiff did remarry prior to the death of her mother, it is urged that she did not comply with the condition precedent, that her rights are therefore barred, and that the question of the validity of the condition subsequent or limitation is thus made moot. The defendant further insists that if the condition against remarriage becomes relevant it is not against public policy. In support of this position, defendant attempts to convince the court that the rule with regard to restraints upon marriage varies from that applicable to the case of remarriage.

Jurisdiction of this case rests upon diversity of citizenship and therefore the Illinois law of conflicts, the law [638]*638of the forum, is determinative of substantive rights. Smith v. Dravo Corp., 7 Cir., 1953, 203 F.2d 369. In Frankel v. Allied Mills, Inc., 1938, 369 Ill. 578, 582, 17 N.E.2d 570, 571, the applicable Illinois law of conflicts is stated to be that

“the validity, construction and obligation of a contract must be determined by the law of the place where it is made or is to be performed.”

While the evidence does not definitely disclose where the contract was made, there are indications that it was executed in Chicago, Illinois, where the office of the escrowee was located. Also it is apparent that the performance of the contract and Clause 6 thereof has essentially taken place in Illinois. This court concludes, therefore, that the Illinois public policy will govern in determining the validity of the contract here involved.

There are express pronouncements in Illinois that perpetual restraints of marriage are against public policy, except where imposed by one spouse upon the other. In Shackelford v. Hall, 1857, 19 Ill. 212, 214, the following clause of a will was presented to the eourt:

“ ‘And I will and bequeath all my real estate, money and personal property, and choses in action to my wife, Ann H. Hall, during her widowhood, and in case she does not marry, during her natural life, and at her death, I will and bequeath to Henry Hall, Eliza Hall, John P. Hall and Robert Hall, my entire estate, both real and personal, to be equally divided share and share about.’ ”

The court then held:

“By this, the estate vested, absolutely and immediately upon the death of the testator, in the devisees ,as .specified; in the widow a life estate, if not sooner terminated by her marriage, and the remainder in the four other devisees.”

.and at page 215 the court stated:

“[W]hoever will take the trouble to examine this branch of the law .■attentively, will find that the testator may impose reasonable and prudent restraints upon the marriage of the objects of his bounty, by means of conditions precedent, or subsequent, or by limitations, while he may not, with one single exception, [the case of a husband making bequests or legacies until the remarriage of his wife] impose perpetual celibacy upon the objects of his bounty, by means of conditions subsequent or limitations.”

The Supreme Court of Illinois reiterated the rule in Glass v. Johnson, 1921, 297 Ill. 149, 130 N.E. 473, wherein a testator limited the rights of his wife if she should remarry, and at page 151 of 297 Ill., at page 474 of 130 N.E., the court said:

“This condition, though in total restraint of marriage, is valid. There is an exception to the rule that a testator may not impose a total restraint upon marriage as a condition of a devise in the case of a husband making a devise to his wife.”

The same public policy which invalidates conditions in restraint of marriage in deeds or wills is applicable where the restraint is imposed by contract. Fletcher v. Osborn, 1917, 282 Ill. 143, 118 N.E. 446, L.R.A.1918C, 331. In the light of the Illinois law it is incumbent upon the court to construe the meaning of Clause 6 of the contract.

The intention of the parties must be asertained from the instrument as a whole, with particular regard to Clause 6 and the attending circumstances in which it was negotiated. Plast v. Metropolitan Trust Co., 1948, 401 Ill. 302, 82 N.E.2d 155. The contract was the product of an arms length transaction wherein each bargained in his own best interest, and the payment of royalties to the mother and daughter constituted a material part of the total consideration. This is evident from the deposition of Ogden Sells, that the provision for Dorothy was obtained after two hours of negotiation, but the payments to his mother were agreed upon in five

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Bluebook (online)
166 F. Supp. 636, 1958 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3586, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/shackleton-v-food-machinery-chemical-corp-illinoised-1958.