Westcott v. Cady

5 Johns. Ch. 334, 1821 N.Y. LEXIS 107, 1821 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 43
CourtNew York Court of Chancery
DecidedJuly 14, 1821
StatusPublished
Cited by39 cases

This text of 5 Johns. Ch. 334 (Westcott v. Cady) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Court of Chancery primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Westcott v. Cady, 5 Johns. Ch. 334, 1821 N.Y. LEXIS 107, 1821 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 43 (N.Y. 1821).

Opinion

The Chancellor.

The cause was brought to a hearing upon the bill of revivor and supplement, and the exhibits referred to in the pleadings. 1. The first question is as to the extent of the relief to which the party may be entitled, under these pleadings. The defendants contend, that the plaintiffs can have no other relief, than what they were entitled to under the the original bill, and that under that bill, they were entitled only to the exhibition of an inventory from Margaret Chinn. The original bill went further, and prayed not only for an account of the estate of Edward Chinn, dec., but that the same mightbe applied in a course of administration, and the plaintiffs paid the proportion or share of the estate, to which they were entitled under the will of E. C. But the present bill is not only a bill of revivor, made .necessary by the death of M. C. the original defendant, L;ut it is a bill of revivor and supplement, and- sets forth the new rights accruing to the plaintiffs by the death of M. C.; and the defendants, by their answer submit to account, and to the revival of the suit.

A bill of revivor and supplement not only continues the [343]*343suit, upon abatement, but it supplies defects arising from some event subsequent to the institution of the suit. It is a compound of a supplemental bill and bill of revivor, and in that character, it states the original bill, and proceedings thereon, and the subsequent event; and it states also the consequent alteration or acquisition of interest, with respect to the parties, (Redf. Tr. 33. 74.) I apprehend, that the plaintiffs can obtain, under the present pleadings, all the relief, which the facts and the merits of the case will authorize.

Where letters of administration under the seal of the Court of Probates, in due form, are produced, this Court will deem them to be regular and valid without looking beyond them. A will and codicil are to be taken and construed together as parts of one and the same instrument.

2. Another objection, of a technical kind, is, that the plaintiffs are aliens, and residents in England, and that they have not qualified themselves, according to law, to sue here as administrators. The answer to this is, that letters of administration, under the seal of the Court of Probates of this State, are produced, and I am bound to presume omnia rite acta, and to give full credit to the judicial acts of a competent jurisdiction. I am not to look beyond the letters of administration sub pede sigilli. Lord Talbot, in Tourton v. Flower, (3 P. Wms. 370.) observed, in answer to an objection to the validity of the administration, “ here being an administration taken out of the Archbishop’s Court, I will look upon the same to be good.”

3. Having disposed of these preliminary objections, we come to the consideration of the real merits of the claim of the plaintiffs.

Their rights depend upon the construction to be given to the will and codicil of Edward Chinn. P shall take it for granted, as a clear and settled rule, (see, for this purpose, Willet v. Sandford, 1 Vesey 186.) that a will and codocil are to be taken and construed together, in connection with each other, as parts of one and the same instrument. The intent of the testator is to he gathered from tiie whole, and a codicil is no revocation of a will, further than it is expressed.

[344]*344The will gave to the testator’s wife, M. C., an annuity, for life, of500 dollars, to be received and paid tó her, yearly, from his loan office certificates, and it gave to her certain specific chattels, as farming utensils, household furniture, and servants, absolutely, and it gave to her, for life, the rents and profits of a farm at Claverack. All the rest and residue of his estate, real and personal, not otherwise devised in the will, in what place or what kind soever it might be, and including expressly the reversion of the annuity of 500 dollars and the reversion of the Claverack Farm, he gave to his brother Charles Chinn, and his sister Sarah Wood, and to them and their heirs forever. He further declared that all the children of his said brother and sister should have an equal share of every thing he should leave, and that if his brother died without children, the children of his sister should enjoy the whole between them equally„

It is admitted, that the sister, Sarah Wood, died before the testator, and that the plaintiffs, Susannah and Mary, are her next of kin, and heirs at law, and that Charles Chinn died after the testator, and that the plaintiffs, S. and M. are also his next kin, and heirs at law.

Upon the will, as it thus originally stood, there could not have been a doubt, but that C. C. and S. W. and their representatives, took the remainder of the loan office certificates, after her death, and that she was only to have an annuity of 500 dollars, during life, out of the interest or dividends of that stock. The testator evidently intended by the words, loan office certificates, his three per cent stock, of the United States, and the bequest over, after that annuity ceased, was clearly good. There could have been no more difficulty upon this part of the will, as to the stock, than as to the remainder in fee of the Claverack farm, after the life estate therein had ended. The more colourable ground of resistance to the claim of the bill, is derived from the codicil. In that, the testator states*that since the date [345]*345of his will, he had sold the Claverack farm, and turned it into personal property, and it being his desire, that his wife should have the “ income, profit, use, and enjoyment of that estate during her life,” he accordingly bequeathed to her, “ during her natural life,” the principal and interest due him on the sale of that estate. The codicil not only, so far, substituted the use of the proceeds, instead of the use of the farm; but it went further, and gave to her, “ during her natural life, the use, interest, and enjoyment of all the moneys he had in possession, and all the interest he had in the funds or stock of the ¡7. S. and public securities and the executors were directed to draw for those moneys “ to and for the use of his wifef and to invest her wilh full power to receive and manage the same, “ for and during her natural lifeand out of these moneys, to discharge his funeral expenses, and that after those expenses were paid, that she should “have, enjoy, use, and manage, to her own best advantage, for and duringher natural life, all and singular his estate, moneys, and personal property above mentioned.”

The gift, by the codicil, to the wife, of an interest for life in the moneys and stock, as well as in the proceeds of the Claverack farm, does not affect or impair the devise over in and by the will. There is no incompatibility between the bequests in the codicil and the devise over in the will; but the codicil pursues the intention of the will in confining the use of the Claverack estate to her life; and it only enlarges the quantum of interest which she was to enjoy for life, by exchanging the annuity of 500 dollars, for life, chargeable upon the public stock, for the use for life of all his cash in hand, and of all his government stock.

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Bluebook (online)
5 Johns. Ch. 334, 1821 N.Y. LEXIS 107, 1821 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 43, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/westcott-v-cady-nychanct-1821.