Smith v. Shanahan

50 N.E.2d 397, 314 Mass. 329, 1943 Mass. LEXIS 849
CourtMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
DecidedJune 30, 1943
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 50 N.E.2d 397 (Smith v. Shanahan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Smith v. Shanahan, 50 N.E.2d 397, 314 Mass. 329, 1943 Mass. LEXIS 849 (Mass. 1943).

Opinion

Qua, J.

This is a petition in equity brought in a Probate Court by the widow of Joseph Mortimer Smith wherein she seeks to reclaim for the estate of said Smith from J. Newton Smith, who is trustee under the will of Sarah Fuller Smith, a sum of about $113,000 paid to J. Newton Smith by Joseph Mortimer Smith in his lifetime under circumstances which will hereinafter appear.

Joseph N. Smith, who was the grandfather of Joseph Mortimer Smith and of his twin brother John Spicer Smith, died in 1912, leaving a will in which he provided for the distribution of the principal of a trust fund to his twin grandchildren in equal shares when they should become twenty-one years of age. Sarah Fuller Smith, who had been the wife and had become the widow of Joseph N. Smith, apparently fearing that her twin grandchildren might not conserve the sums which under her husband’s will were to be paid to them outright, made her own will, in Article 5 of which she gave the sum of $30,000 to J. Newton Smith in trust to use the income for the benefit of the two grandchildren until they should become thirty-five years of age, [331]*331when the trustee was to pay over to each of them forty per cent of his “apparent share” of the principal, and thereafter the trustee was to continue to pay to each during his life the income from the balance of his share. Each grandchild was also given a power to dispose by will of “his apparent share of the principal as it may exist at the date of his death.” In default of such testamentary disposition “such share” was to go to the then heirs at law of the testatrix. But it was further provided that each grandchild should take no further benefit and have no power of appointment under this trust unless, upon receiving his share of the principal under the will of Joseph N. Smith, he should forthwith “convey and transfer” it to the person who at the time should be trustee under the will of Sarah Fuller Smith, “to be held upon the same terms and conditions as are set forth in this Article Fifth . . . .” Other dispositions were provided for the share in the $30,000 fund of either grandson who should fail thus to pay over the sum received by him under the will of Joseph N. Smith. The testatrix no doubt expected or hoped that by conditionally offering her grandsons the benefit of the $30,000 trust fund created by her she could persuade them to exchange the outright gifts of the sums coming to them at the age of twenty-one under their grandfather’s will for forty per cent of those sums at the age of thirty-five with the benefit of the income before they should reach that age, the income of the balance of said sums thereafter for life, and a power of disposal of the principal by will.

The grandmother, Sarah Fuller Smith, died in 1931. The twin grandchildren became twenty-one years of age in 1932, and each thereupon transferred to J. Newton Smith, who was then trustee under the grandmother’s will, the sum received by each under the grandfather’s will, amounting in each instance to about $113,000. J. Newton Smith has at all times treated and administered these two sums, together with the original $30,000 fund received by him as trustee under Article 5 of the will of Sarah Fuller Smith, “as a single trust fund without distinction as to the source from which said properties were derived.” His first account has [332]*332been allowed, showing the sum paid him by Joseph Mortimer Smith as received on account of-principal of that trust. Joseph Mortimer Smith made a will in 1935, married the petitioner in 1939, and died in September, 1941, before reaching the age of thirty-five, and while all the sums hereinbefore referred to were held by J. Newton Smith as trustee. By his will Joseph Mortimer Smith left all his property in equal shares to his twin brother, the respondent John Spicer Smith, and to the respondent Carolyn M. Engler, and specifically included in the gift to each a half of his “apparent share of any principal as it may exist at the date of . . . [his] death, and due . . . [him] under . . . the will of . . . [his] late grandmother, Sarah Fuller Smith and . . . [his] late grandfather Joseph N. Smith.” But inasmuch as Joseph Mortimer Smith’s will did not appear to have been made in contemplation of marriage, his subsequent marriage revoked it, and the will was admitted to probate only in so far as it could operate upon property subject to his disposal by way of appointment under the will of Sarah Fuller Smith. G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 191, § 9. An administrator has therefore been appointed to settle his estate.

The widow and children of Joseph Mortimer Smith now contend upon various grounds that the trust in the sum of about $113,000 ended with his death; that his attempted exercise of his power of appointment is invalid; and that there is a resulting trust to his estate of the sum of about $113,000 which he turned over to J. Newton Smith, trustee. The appointees under the will of Joseph Mortimer Smith contend that the appointment to them is valid. A claim to the $113,000 sum is also made by the heirs of Sarah Fuller Smith. We need not decide these conflicting claims, since we are of opinion that the Probate Court correctly dismissed this petition on the ground that its entire subject matter is res judicata for reasons now to be stated.

In November, 1941, after the death of Joseph Mortimer Smith, the respondent J. Newton Smith, who was then holding and treating as a single trust fund the $30,000 which he had originally received under the will of Sarah Fuller [333]*333Smith and the two sums of about $113,000 each which he had subsequently received from Joseph Mortimer Smith and John Spicer Smith, filed in the Probate Court a petition wherein he described himself as trustee under the will of Sarah Fuller Smith. In his petition he set forth the provisions of that will. He also set forth the facts substantially as hereinbefore stated relative to the will of Joseph N. Smith, the payment to J. Newton Smith by the twin grandchildren of the two sums of about $113,000 each, his treating of those two sums and the original $30,000 as constituting a single trust fund in his hands, the will of Joseph Mortimer Smith, and the relationship of the members of the Smith family, and he prayed the court for instructions, among other things, “to what extent (if at all), with respect to what property (if any), and for the benefit of what person or persons (if any),” the will of Joseph Mortimer Smith operated as an exercise of the testamentary power of appointment given to said Joseph Mortimer Smith by the will of Sarah Fuller Smith, and to what person or persons and in what amounts or shares the petitioner (J. Newton Smith) should pay “the property which he holds in the corpus of the trust established” by said will in so far as held thereunder for the benefit of Joseph Mortimer Smith and his successors in interest. All parties to the present proceeding were parties to the petition for instructions, except a child then unborn, who was represented by a guardian ad litem.

In view of the fact that the petition for instructions was brought by J.

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Bluebook (online)
50 N.E.2d 397, 314 Mass. 329, 1943 Mass. LEXIS 849, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/smith-v-shanahan-mass-1943.