Weymouth v. Delaware Trust Co.

45 A.2d 427, 29 Del. Ch. 1, 1946 Del. Ch. LEXIS 53
CourtCourt of Chancery of Delaware
DecidedJanuary 11, 1946
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 45 A.2d 427 (Weymouth v. Delaware Trust Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Chancery of Delaware primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Weymouth v. Delaware Trust Co., 45 A.2d 427, 29 Del. Ch. 1, 1946 Del. Ch. LEXIS 53 (Del. Ct. App. 1946).

Opinion

Pearson, Vice-Chancellor:

The question is whether a trust may be revoked by the sole beneficiary, who is also the settlor, where the trust instrument contains provisions declaring the trust irrevocable and attempting to restrict anticipation, alienation, or transfer of the beneficiary’s interest under the trust, and to limit the rights of his creditors with respect to his interest.

In January 1940, complainant, the corporate respondent, and one C. R. Martin entered into a trust agreement. Complainant was the settlor, and he, the corporate respondent, and Martin were the trustees. Complainant transferred securities and cash to the trustees to be held subject to the terms of the agreement. These include a direction that the trustees shall manage and invest the trust property and

“* * * shall pay the net income of the Trust Fund to the said Trustor in monthly or other convenient installments during his life; provided, however, that the Trustees shall retain so much of the net income of the Trust Fund as may from time to time be designated in writing by the Trustor, which said income so retained by the Trustees shall be added to, commingled with and become a part of the corpus of the Trust Fund. Upon the death of the Trustor, George T. Weymouth, the Trust Fund herein created shall forthwith terminate, and the corpus of the Trust Fund as then constituted together with any income accrued thereon shall be transferred, set over and delivered by the Trustees to the executors or administrators of the Trustor’s estate to be held and administered in the manner provided by the last Will and Testament of the Trustor, or if he shall die intestate, or fail to direct by will the distribution thereof, according to the intestate law of the State of Delaware.”

The agreement also provides in a paragraph designated I (2) :

“The interest of the beneficiary hereunder, either as to income or principal of the Trust Fund, shall not be anticipated, alienated, or in any other manner assigned, or transferred by said beneficiary, nor [3]*3shall the same be subject to any legal process, bankruptcy proceedings or the interference or control of creditors or others. All payments of income and principal herein provided for shall be made by the Trustees into the hands of the beneficiary entitled thereto, or mailed to such beneficiary’s last known address, or deposited to the account of such beneficiary in a bank or trust company of good standing and responsibility, without regard to any order or assignment purporting to transfer the same to any other person. * * *”

In a later paragraph, it is provided:

“This trust shall be irrevocable.”

The only express indication, contained in the agreement, of the purpose or motive for the creation of the trust is the recital that “the Trustor desires to establish a trust of certain securities and cash * * In the bill, complainant alleges:

“At the time of the execution of the said Trust Agreement, the complainant was of the opinion that such a trust would enable him to save money and reduce the inheritance taxes upon his estate at the time of his death. It was for those purposes that the complainant created said trust.”

Answering that paragraph, the corporate respondent states that it has no definite knowledge of the matters and things thus set forth, “but is informed and believes that they are true and admits the same for the purpose of this suit without in any wise conceding the same +0 be a limitation upon the legal effect, if any, of paragraph I (2) of the said Trust Agreement” quoted above.

The three trustees proceeded to administer the trust. In March 1945, Martin resigned as trustee and no successor to him has been chosen. In May 1945, complainant wrote a letter to the corporate trustee stating that he was advised that he had the power to revoke it, and that he did thereby exercise that power and direct the corporate trustee to deliver to him all properties constituting the corpus of the trust. The corporate trustee declined to comply, and asserts in its answer that because of the “spendthrift provisions” [4]*4and the irrevocable character of the trust, complainant is without power to revoke it.

Both parties accept it to be a general rule that where the settlor is the sole beneficiary and is not under an incapacity, he may compel the termination of the trust which he created. See H. M. Byllesby & Co. v. Doriot, 25 Del. Ch. 46, 12 A. 2d 603. Complainant, the settlor, is entitled to all net income to be distributed, and at his death, the fund remaining is distributable to his executors or administrators. He is, therefore, the “sole beneficiary” of the trust, in the sense in which we are now considering that expression. DuPont, et al., v. DuPont, et al., 19 Del. Ch. 131, 164 A. 238; 1 Scott on Trusts, § 127.1.

It is apparent that by the terms of the agreement, revocation is forbidden: the trust is expressly declared “irrevocable”; the direction that the beneficiary’s interest shall not be anticipated is of like import; and it may well be that the directions that his interest shall not be alienated, assigned, or transferred, or subject to creditors’ interference or control imply a similar intent of the parties to the agreement. However, the statement in a trust instrument that the trust is irrevocable is not sufficient to prevent termination by the sole settlor who is the sole beneficiary. H. M. Byllesby and Co. v. Doriot, supra. In determining whether a trust may be lawfully revoked, it would seem reasonable that directions prohibiting revocation which happen to form a part of terms commonly denominated by the classification “spendthrift trust provisions” should be accorded no more importance than the express statement that the trust shall be “irrevocable.” If the intent evidenced by the trust instrument were deemed determinative, clearly, in either case, intended irrevocability is indicated.

Concerning somewhat related questions, complainant cites many authorities for the proposition that attempted restraints (spendthrift trust provisions) on the voluntary or involuntary transfer of the interest of a beneficiary who [5]*5is the settlor are ineffective. Brown v. Macgill, 87 Md. 161, 39 A. 613, 39 L. R. A. 806, 67 Am. St. Rep. 334; Jamison v. Mississippi Valley Trust Co., (Mo.) 207 S.W. 788; Pacific National Bank v. Windram, 133 Mass. 175; McColgan v. Walter Magee, 172 Cal. 182, 155 P. 995, Ann. Cas. 1917D, 1050. Annotations 119 A.L.R. 19, 35; 138 A. L. R. 1319, 1323; 1 Restatement of Trusts, § 156; 1 Scott on Trusts, § 156.

The corporate trustee relies strongly on Ashhurst’s Appeal, 77 Pa. 464; Rehr v. Fidelity-Philadelphia Trust Co., 310 Pa. 301, 165 A. 380, 91 A. L. R. 99; Hackley v. Littell, 150 Mich. 106, 113 N.W. 787. In the Ashhurst and Hackley cases, the courts apparently considered that the trusts were created to protect the settlors from extravagance or improvidence. In this connection, the respondent corporate trustee has taken the position in its main brief that

“It must be admitted on the basis of the pleadings herein that the trust was not created to protect the settlor from his own folly.”

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Grynberg v. Burke
410 A.2d 169 (Court of Chancery of Delaware, 1979)
Smith v. Bank of Delaware
219 A.2d 576 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1966)
Harrison v. City National Bank of Clinton, Iowa
210 F. Supp. 362 (S.D. Iowa, 1962)
Lewis v. Hanson
128 A.2d 819 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1957)
Du Pont v. Equitable Security Trust Company
122 A.2d 429 (Supreme Court of Delaware, 1956)
Du Pont v. EQUITABLE SECURITY TRUST COMPANY
115 A.2d 482 (Court of Chancery of Delaware, 1955)
duPont v. Equitable Security Trust Co.
115 A.2d 482 (Court of Chancery of Delaware, 1955)
Security Trust Co. v. Sharp
77 A.2d 543 (Court of Chancery of Delaware, 1950)
Wilmington Trust Co. v. Carpenter
75 A.2d 815 (Court of Chancery of Delaware, 1950)
Bixby v. California Trust Co.
202 P.2d 1018 (California Supreme Court, 1949)
Tracey v. Franklin
61 A.2d 780 (Court of Chancery of Delaware, 1948)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
45 A.2d 427, 29 Del. Ch. 1, 1946 Del. Ch. LEXIS 53, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/weymouth-v-delaware-trust-co-delch-1946.