Strayer v. Long

3 S.E. 372, 83 Va. 715, 1887 Va. LEXIS 115
CourtSupreme Court of Virginia
DecidedSeptember 22, 1887
StatusPublished
Cited by19 cases

This text of 3 S.E. 372 (Strayer v. Long) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Virginia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Strayer v. Long, 3 S.E. 372, 83 Va. 715, 1887 Va. LEXIS 115 (Va. 1887).

Opinion

Lacy, J.,

delivered the opinion of the court.

In February, 1879, the appellee, Long, and others, judgment lien creditors of Joseph B. Strayer, filed their bill in behalf of themselves, and all other lien creditors of said Strayer who should come in and contribute their share of the costs of the suit against said Strayer and his wife, seeking to subject the real estate of the said Strayer to their liens, and to set aside a conveyance made by him to a trustee, of a part of his real estate for the benefit of his said wife and her children. And the said circuit court having rendered two decrees, one on the eleventh day of January, 1881, and the other on the sixth day of April of the same year, by which the said Strayer and wife considered themselves aggrieved, an appeal was taken to this court, and at the September term, 1883, of this court both of said decrees were reversed, and a decree rendered here on the seventeenth day of October, 1883, which was ordered to be and was certified down to the said circuit court of Shenandoah county. The reasons for this decree were stated in writing by Judge Hinton, and filed and preserved with the records of this court, and no further notice will be taken of the said decrees here.

The cause coming on further to be considered in the said [717]*717circuit court of Shenandoah county, tlie said decree of this court of October 17, 1883, having been recorded in the said court in this cause, a reference was had to a commissioner, accounts taken and reported, with the depositions taken in the cause, and the said report of the commissioner having been excepted to by the defendants in that court, the appellants here, the said circuit court of Shenandoah county, on the fourth day of September, 1885, rendered its decree, overruling the exceptions of the defendants—except the fourth, which was substantially sustained—and decreeing the sale of all the lands of the said Strayer. Whereupon the appellants applied for and obtained an appeal from one of the judges of this court.

The first assignment of error here, now, is that the decree of this court, rendered October 17, 1883, prescribing the order of time in which the several tracts of land should be sold, has been disregarded. It was decreed in this court as follows: “The court is of opinion that if the said deed of settlement shall hereafter be held to be invalid, the-land thereby conveyed, and known as the bStrickier Farm/ must, to the extent of said Joseph B. Stray er’s interest therein, be subjected to the liens of the judgment creditors before any of the other lands of the defendants can be sold for that purpose.” The circuit court of Shenandoah county, in the decree complained of, decreed the sale of all the lands of the defendant in the decree directing the said “Strickler Farm” to be sold, after directing the sale of all the others, thus reversing exactly the order of sale as prescribed by this court in its decree of October 17, 1883. It will not be denied that the circuit court of Shenandoah is bound by the decree of this court, and must obey it, whether the same meet with its approval or not, and entirely without reference to the question whether the reasoning of this court is satisfactory to that court or altogether otherwise; and we reverse the decree of that court for that [718]*718cause alone, without again entering upon any argument concerning it. That court being of opinion that it is “ now manifest from the papers in this cause that, in the most favorable aspect in which the interest of Joseph B. Strayer and his wife can be regarded, his lands will, in any event, prove far inadequate to satisfy the undisputed lien debts ascertained now to rest upon them, and that a just regard for the interests of all parties forbids further delay in the sale of the lands,” etc., can form no justification for the decree which was rendered in direct opposition to the final judgment of this court on that very question; and, the same being in contravention of the opinion of this court, the said court was incompetent to have such an opinion judicially, or to enter such decree. But notwithstanding the fact that the cause will be for this reason reversed and remanded, as the cause must go back to the-lower court we will proceed to consider the othér assignment of errors, for the guidance of the court in its further-progress.

The second assignment of error is as to the action of the-court in overruling the second exception of the, defendants to the commissioner’s report. . That is, that no trustee was in existence when the accounts were taken under the decree of the January term, 1885, and no trustee when the decree was rendered—the trustee, Bodes, having died. The circuit court overruled this exception, upon the ground that the cause had been revived against the administrator of said Bodes, trustee, at the January term, 1885, who had, it is contended, all the rights, powers, and duties of thé trustee himself. Section 9, chapter 174, V. 0., provides that the-personal representative of a sole or surviving trustee shall execute the trust, or so much thereof as remained unexecuted at the death of such trustee (whether the trust-subject be real or personal estate), unless the instrument creating the trust otherwise directs, or some other trustee [719]*719be appointed for the purpose by a court of chancery having jurisdiction of the case. And the eighth section of the same chapter provides that “ in a suit in equity, in which it appears that a trustee has died, although the heirs of such trustee be not parties to the suit, yet if his personal representative and the other persons interested be parties, the court may appoint another trustee in the place of him who died, to act,” etc. There are cases where the personal representative of the trustee may, under the authority of the ninth section above cited, execute the trust; but in such a case as this, involving the trusts under this deed of settlement, it was the duty of the court to appoint a trustee under the provisions of the eighth section, supra, and we think the court erred in proceeding with the suit to overturn the trust-deed without first appointing some suitable person to act as trustee under this deed, and to place every proper safeguard around the rights of the married woman and her infant children.

The next assignment of error is that the court overruled the third exception to the commissioner’s report, which was upon the ground that the guardian ad litem was not notified of the taking of the accounts. Publication having been substituted by the court in lieu of personal service, the names of the infants being inserted in the publication, the guardian ad litem not being named therein, nor otherwise served with notice, the circuit court held the notice sufficient, and that no service on the guardian ad litem was necessary. The appointment of guardians ad litem, says Mr. Coke, is incident to every court. By the provisions of our law the courts of equity are empowered to appoint guardians ad litem, whether the infant has been served with notice or not, and to compel the person so appointed to act. But he is not liable to costs, and is to be allowed all reasonable charges, to be paid by the party at whose motion he was appointed, and to be taxed in the bill of [720]*720costs. His duty is to manage the interests of the infant in that suit in which he is appointed. Such guardian 'ad litem

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Bluebook (online)
3 S.E. 372, 83 Va. 715, 1887 Va. LEXIS 115, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/strayer-v-long-va-1887.