Swigart v. Knox

196 P.2d 246, 165 Kan. 410, 1948 Kan. LEXIS 490
CourtSupreme Court of Kansas
DecidedJuly 10, 1948
DocketNo. 37,032
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 196 P.2d 246 (Swigart v. Knox) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Swigart v. Knox, 196 P.2d 246, 165 Kan. 410, 1948 Kan. LEXIS 490 (kan 1948).

Opinions

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Smith, J.:

This is an action to partition the corpus of a trust consisting of real estate under the terms of a will. The estate was partitioned and what would have been the share of one of the [411]*411beneficiaries was by the trial court in its final judgment awarded to a party to whom this beneficiary had mortgaged it and who had foreclosed the mortgage and was in possession. This beneficiary has appealed. An action involving this trust filed many years ago and in which orders have been made from time to time and which had not been finally determined was consolidated with this action in the lower court. The appealable order was made, however, in the action to distribute the corpus of the trust.

About many of the facts there is no dispute. Samuel M. Knox, out of whose will this action arose, died testate a resident of Allen county, Kansas, on May 14, 1907. His will was duly admitted to probate in Allen county. He owned at his death 4,800 acres of land in that county as well as some land in other states. He left surviving him his widow Hannah, Mary K. Stevens, a daughter, and Samuel E. Knox and Anson H. Knox, sons.

The will named Hannah H. Knox and Mary K. Stevens as executors and also as trustees under the trust created by the will. The will contained ten paragraphs. It bequeathed all the testator’s real estate in trust to his wife and two daughters. It set up a somewhat involved trust and provided that none of the real estate bequeathed should be sold as long as any of testator’s children should live, except to pay debts; directed the trustees to lease the farm lands, and to keep the income from the Allen county farm land separate from that from other real estate. The will then bequeathed the rents from the real estate in trust to the trustees and directed that it should be equally. divided among testator’s children. The will then contained a clause, as follows:

“And I will and direct that no part of real or personal estate hereby devised or bequeathed in trust to said named trustees and the survivor of them and their successors in trust hereunder or directed herein to be held and considered as a part of the trust estate hereby created, and no part of the rents, income or proceeds from such trust estate shall, prior to the actual division thereof and the actual delivery or conveyance thereof to the beneficiaries entitled thereto hereunder or while the same is in the custody possession or under the control of said named trustees or the survivor of them or their successors in trust hereunder, in any manner whatsoever, be bargained, sold, assigned, conveyed, mortgaged or incumbered by my said wife or either of my children, other than as trustee hereunder, or by either of my descendants or by either of my next of kin or be subject to any debt of or claim against my said wife or either of my children or either of my descendants or either of my next of kin or be subject to any suit or proceeding brought to collect any such debt or claim out of the share of my wife or share of any such child, descendant or next of kin, and in making divisions of such trust estate and the rents, income [412]*412and proceeds therefrom as in this will directed, said named trustees and the survivor of them and their successors in trust hereunder shall utterly disregard all and every transfer, assignment, conveyance or incumbrance thereof or any part thereof made by my said wife or by either of such children, descendants or next of kin.”

The will then provided that at the death of the testator’s last surviving child the real estate bequeathed should be equally divided per stirpes between testator’s then surviving descendants and also that the trustees should report to a district court in Illinois as to land located in that state and to the district court of Allen county as to land located there.

It appears clear that the trust created by the will was what is designated a spendthrift trust. Soon after the will was admitted to probate Hannah exercised the option provided for her by statute and elected to take under it rather than under the will. Pursuant to this election one-half of the 4,800 acres of Allen county land was set off to her. This left 2,400 acres in the trust.

On November 1, 1910, Hannah Knox and Mary K. Stevens filed an action in the district court of Allen county, in which they asked instructions as to how to administer this trust. Anson H. Knox and Samuel F. Knox were named defendants in that action. Service was had on both of them. From now on in this opinion for the sake of clarity this action will be referred to as case number 9,159.

The district court sustained a demurrer to the petition.

On appeal we reversed the district court. (See Knox v. Knox, 87 Kan. 381, 124 Pac. 409.) It was argued here that the petition was demurrable because no particular dilemma, upon which judgment could be pronounced, was -shown to exist. In dealing with this argument we discussed the broad general nature of suits to construe wills and said the court below could, upon motion of either party or on its own motion, cause the petition to be made definite and certain so as to present issues upon the various provisions of the will in such a manner as would admit of an orderly trial and final judgment. With such an opinion the judgment sustaining the demurrer to the petition was reversed and the case remanded to the district court for further proceedings.

On July 27,1912, the plaintiffs in case 9,159 filed an amended petition. They alleged they were in grave doubt as to the construction of the will because it was indefinite, uncertain and contradictory and asked for instructions. Issues were joined and the parties entered into a stipulation. As a part of it Hannah H. Knox and [413]*413Mary K. Stevens withdrew as trustees and Mary K. Stevens relinquished all her right, title and interest in any of the real estate in question and she, together with Samuel F. Knox and Anson H. Knox, agreed that the 2,400 acres of Allen county land remaining in the trust after one-half of the original 4,800 acres had been .allotted to Hannah was to be partitioned between Samuel F. Knox and Anson H. Knox. The tract with which we are interested here is 400 acres, a portion of the 1,200 acres awarded to Anson H. Knox. The trial court found that the land left in the trust could not be managed under it at a profit nor to the best interest of the parties and partitioned it as provided in the stipulation. The decree of the court provided the land was allotted to them in fee simple. Anson H. Knox was appointed trustee of the 1,200 acres awarded to him and Samuel F. Knox was appointed trustee of the land allotted to him. Jurisdiction of the entire matter was retained by the court. Anson H. Knox died June 8, 1929. He left surviving him Samuel M. Knox, Jr., who is the appellant here, and Edna Knox Swigart and Mary Knox Finster, the latter two daughters who brought this action for partition. They all three filed proceedings in the district court in case 9,159 of which the trial court had retained jurisdiction and asked that trustees for the 1,200 acres be appointed to succeed him, their father Anson H. Knox. The trial court on July 12, 1930, found that upon the termination of the trust the applicants would be entitled to the entire property held by Anson at his death; that they had agreed amongst themselves to a division of it when the trust estate was terminated and that it would be to the advantage of each of them to be appointed trustee over the land which would eventually belong to each of them.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
196 P.2d 246, 165 Kan. 410, 1948 Kan. LEXIS 490, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/swigart-v-knox-kan-1948.