Succession of Ratcliff

24 So. 2d 456, 209 La. 224, 1945 La. LEXIS 929
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedNovember 5, 1945
DocketNo. 37949.
StatusPublished
Cited by17 cases

This text of 24 So. 2d 456 (Succession of Ratcliff) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Succession of Ratcliff, 24 So. 2d 456, 209 La. 224, 1945 La. LEXIS 929 (La. 1945).

Opinion

HAMITER, Justice.

Ernest R. Ratcliff, a resident of Caddo Parish, departed this life on October. 6, 1943, leaving as his widow in community Mrs. Helen L. Ratcliff, to whom he was married on November 9, 1937 (his third wife). Of this union there was no issue; however, of each of his two previous marriages a child survived, Mrs. Bessie R. Gray, who was born of the first, being one of the ■children.

The last will and testament of decedent, dated September 28, 1943, directed that his ■estate be administered by J. E. Webb (his secretary and bookkeeper) and B. H. Gray (his son-in-law and the husband of Mrs. Bessie R. Gray), they to serve without bond •or other security; but in such instrument he made no disposition of his property. These persons, after being recognized and confirmed as testamentary executors by order ■of court, proceeded to administer both the separate and community estates. In due course, but following the .occurrence of •considerable litigation between them and the widow, the executors filed their first annual account, and later they supplemented and enlarged it with a written report prepared by Messrs. Frost and Heard, accountants and auditors, listing the assets'and liabilities and the receipts and disbursements of the separate and community estates.

To the account as supplemented, Mrs. Helen L. Ratcliff, the widow in community, filed oppositions, she opposing it generally and also opposing many of the items thereon specifically.

The district court, after a regular hearing, ruled in favor of the widow on many of her oppositions to specific items. Thereupon the executors appealed from some of the rulings, and the widow has answered the appeal' praying for a reversal of certain holdings of the court that were unfavorable to her.

First to be considered herein are the complaints of the executors regarding four rulings sustaining oppositions of the widow. Thereafter, we shall pass upon the widow’s protests to the overruling of two of her urged objections.

In the capacity of president of the Hercules Gasoline Company Mr. Ratcliff received a monthly salary of $4,166.66, After his death, which occurred October 6, 1943, the company sent to the executors a salary check for the entire month of October, amounting, after the deducting of the withholding (income) tax, to the sum of $3,359.33. Since decedent had been employed for only six days in that thirty-one day month, the executors prorated the pro-, ceeds of the check in the proportion of 6/31 to the community and 25/31 to the separate estate, they taking the position that the six days’ salary actually earned belonged to the community, and that the balance, constituting a gift made to the executors, inured to the separate estate. The widow, under her opposition that was sustained, shows *229 that the whole payment was for salary — no portion being a gratuity, bonus or donation —and as such it represented community compensation.

In support of their position the executors rely on Blair v. Rosseter, 9 Cir., 33 F.2d 286; Bogardus v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, 302 U.S. 34, 58 S.Ct. 61, 82 L.Ed. 32; and Succession of Goll, 156 La. 910, 101 So. 263.

Clearly the Federal decisions are inapplicable. In each of them the payment involved was unquestionably a gift; it was so denominated by the donor. Here, however, the check obviously was given solely in payment of salary; no part of it was intended or treated as a gift by the Hercules Gasoline Company. It was in the same amount as other salary checks received by decedent. Moreover, the withholding (income) tax was deducted from the whole month’s salary, not from merely a 6/31 thereof. Had the 25/31 portion constituted a gift, as the executors contend, it would not have been subject to that tax.

Neither is the cited Succession of Goll case applicable, .for it deals with the matter of the ownership of rents accruing from real estate after the dissolution of the community. Therein this court properly observed that, “The rents collected after the community was dissolved by the death of Goll belonged to the owners of the property that produced the rents, in proportion to each owner’s interest in the property.”

In the written reasons for judgment assigned in the instant case by the trial judge, the following appropriate comment, with which we thoroughly agree, is offered:

“They [Hercules Gasoline Company] chose to pay him [decedent] a full month’s salary for six days’ work. If the executors are not willing to accept it as such the unearned portion should be returned to the company as paid in error. There is no basis for allocating it to his separate estate. The sum of $2,687.46 must be added to the community receipts for 1943.” (Brackets ours.)

The widow’s opposition to the discussed salary allocation, in our opinion, was correctly sustained.

The executors, appellants herein, next contend that the district court erred in holding, as the widow urged, that the profits of the separate estate which belong and go to the community must be calculated without regard to the actual depreciation of decedent’s individual property. In making this contention they recognize that the present jurisprudence announces a contrary view, it being that the community owes no recompense for, the diminution in value of the effects of the husband or wife by reason of the community’s enjoyment thereof, Depas v. Riez, 2 La.Ann. 30, and Succession of Viaud, 11 La.Ann. 297; but they insist that the jurisprudence on that proposition should be changed. In this connection it is. argued that depreciation is an actual, a continuing, loss; that it is universally recognized in sound accounting practice and in law as being something that must be taken into account in order to determine what profit is made from the use of the property;, and that both the state and federal governments allow reasonable deductions for depreciation as a credit against the income of the owner of the property.

*231 If the suggested change in our jurisprudence is warranted (this we do not concede), it does not appear that it can be effected in this controversy, because there is no proof in the record disclosing actual depreciation of the property involved.

A specific depreciation item of $8,537.50, which the district court held to have been erroneously charged by the executors to the community, relates to certain commercial partnership ventures in which decedent was interested. When married to opponent herein, he was a partner in two concerns. During the existence of the marriage his net revenues therefrom were properly treated as a community income. But in determining the amount of such net revenues or profit the executors deducted from the partnerships’ gross income depreciation on their immovable properties. In opposing the deduction, and maintaining that the community owes no recompense for the diminution in the value of the effects of the husband, the widow shows that under the jurisprudence of this state and Revised Civil Code, Article 2825, the partners of a commercial partnership are the joint owners of all real estate bought for or by the firm. This principle of law is conceded by the executors.

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Bluebook (online)
24 So. 2d 456, 209 La. 224, 1945 La. LEXIS 929, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/succession-of-ratcliff-la-1945.