70 N.C. App. 206 | N.C. Ct. App. | 1984
Lead Opinion
The only question raised on appeal is by defendant executrix. She contends the court erred in ordering her as executrix to pay the remaindermen 359/365 of the $3,500.
The court made no finding as to the exact date the rent was paid and placed into the account of the estate. The executrix apparently contends that the remaindermen are due only the payments coming due “since the last payment.” She further argues that since the statute does not expressly require it, she is not required to pay anyone anything. She argues that the statute only requires the tenant to pay the succeeding owner the rent accrued since the last payment, and that the rights of the tenant against the estate are not before the court.
The applicable statute is as follows:
When any lease for years of any land let for farming on which a rent is reserved determines during a current year of the tenancy, by the happening of any uncertain event . . . the tenant . . . shall continue his occupation to the end of such current year . . . and shall pay to such succeeding owner a part of the rent accrued since the last payment became due, proportionate to the part of the period of payment elapsing after the termination of the estate of the lessor . . .
G.S. 42-7.
Here the rent for the entire year had been paid to the life tenant’s estate. The court correctly declared that the estate of the tenant-lessor was only entitled to the proportion of the rent that had accrued prior to the death of the tenant. The court further correctly declared that the executrix of the estate should pay the rest of the rent, $3,442.47, to the remaindermen.
Although all parties, at trial and on appeal, urge different judicial declarations as to the effect of the lessor’s death on the
In addition to the very familiar provisions of G.S. 1-253 of the Uniform Declaratory Judgment Act, the following provisions are also relevant to the appeal:
G.S. 1-254. Any person interested under a . . . written contract ... or whose rights . . . are affected by a . . . statute, . . . contract or franchise may have determined any question of construction or validity arising under the instrument, statute, . . . contract, or franchise, and obtain a declaration of rights, status, or other legal relations. . . .
G.S. 1-255. Any person interested as or through an executor, . . . creditor ... of the estate of a decedent . . . may have a declaration of rights or legal relations in respect thereto:
(3) To determine any question arising in the administration of the estate. . . .
We feel that when the case is construed with the liberality required by the Uniform Declaratory Judgment Act, it is clear to us that there was and is a controversy between the parties. G.S. 1-264 requires: “This Article is declared to be remedial, its purpose is to settle and to afford relief from uncertainty and insecurity with respect to rights, status, and other legal relations, and it is to be liberally construed and administered.”
It is not hard for us to understand that plaintiffs claimed that the life tenant’s death six days after the execution of the lease of the farm terminated the lease. Defendants, on the other hand, contended that the lease would continue for the full year with the tenant entitled to all the rights he would have had if the life tenant had survived the year. We also have no difficulty understanding that plaintiffs claimed they were entitled to most of the rent money held by the executrix of the estate. The executrix, on the other hand, claimed that all of the rent paid belonged to the estate.
Candor compels the observation that the pleadings in the case at bar do not show the existence of a controversy between the parties as to the meaning of the will or as to their rights thereunder with the explicitness of allegation desirable in declaratory judgment actions. But when these pleadings are interpreted with extreme liberality, they do reveal by implication rather than by express averment that the plaintiffs and the defendants are in dispute as to whether the duties of Lawrence K. Mears as surviving trustee of the testamentary trust have ceased and as to the respective interests given to them by the will and codicil in the store property and the hotel property of the testator in Canton. In consequence, the court below was empowered to render a declaratory judgment covering these matters.
231 N.C. at 118-19, 56 S.E. 2d at 409-10.
Plaintiffs were clearly persons whose rights were affected by the effect of the lease and were entitled to a judicial declaration of those rights by the court. Defendants’ allegations would have denied plaintiffs any rights to the land during the term of the lease and would have denied them any right to the rent paid pursuant to the lease. We hold that the court properly declared the respective right of the parties, whether under G.S. 1-253, G.S. 1-254 or G.S. 1-255.
For the reasons stated, the judgment is affirmed.
Affirmed.
Dissenting Opinion
dissenting.
Although it has been raised directly by neither party, I must first consider whether the trial court had jurisdiction to enter any
While the Uniform Declaratory Judgment Act ... enables courts to take cognizance of disputes at an earlier stage than that ordinarily permitted by the legal procedure which existed before its enactment, it preserves inviolate the ancient and sound juridic concept that the inherent function of judicial tribunals is to adjudicate genuine controversies between antagonistic litigants with respect to their rights, status, or other legal relations. This being so, an action for a declaratory judgment will lie only in a case in which there is an actual or real existing controversy between parties having adverse interests in the matter in dispute.
Id. at 177, 256 S.E. 2d at 267 (quoting Lide v. Mears, 231 N.C. 111, 118, 56 S.E. 2d 404, 409 (1949)). To put it more colorfully: “The Uniform Declaratory Judgment Act does not license litigants to fish in judicial ponds for legal advice.” Kirkman at 177, 256 S.E. 2d at 267 (citation omitted).
In the present case the plaintiffs have not alleged any facts demonstrating any controversy between themselves and either defendant or any controversy between the defendants. Plaintiffs have merely alleged that “certain questions” have arisen as to the construction of the lease. Plaintiffs have not alleged that either of the defendants has made any contention regarding construction of the lease. Nor have plaintiffs alleged that the lease is invalid or ambiguous in any way. Defendants, on the other hand, have merely alleged and prayed that the court declare the lease to be “valid and binding,” in the absence of any suggestion that the lease is invalid or not binding. Plaintiffs have not alleged that they were entitled to immediate possession of the property when Ms. Coleman died, or that defendant Edwards has made any claim to any of the property adverse to the interests of the plaintiffs or defendant Ward. Although plaintiffs ask whether the rent of $3,500.00 “fall[s] outside of the Estate and become[s] the property of the re-mainderman or . . . belongfs] to the Estate with the remainder-man having no interest in the same,” they have not alleged that
While it is true, as the majority states, that all parties “urge different judicial declarations as to the effect of the lessor’s death on the lease and the person entitled to the rent” in the briefs filed in this Court on appeal, there is nothing in the record to indicate that any party urged such “different judicial declarations” at trial. Whether a court has jurisdiction to enter a declaratory judgment in a particular proceeding is determined from the pleadings filed in the cause, not from the briefs filed on appeal.
If it be conceded that the plaintiffs have sufficiently alleged that they are persons interested in the estate of Della Coleman so as to invoke the jurisdiction of the court to enter a declaratory judgment pursuant to G.S. 1-253 and 1-255, the court nevertheless should not have proceeded to judgment, since the record does not disclose that all persons having an interest in the administration of the estate were made parties to the proceeding. G.S. 1-260; Edmondson v. Henderson, 246 N.C. 634, 99 S.E. 2d 869 (1957); Morganton v. Hutton & Bourbonnais Co., 247 N.C. 666, 101 S.E. 2d 679 (1958); Construction Co. v. Board of Education, 278 N.C. 633, 180 S.E. 2d 818 (1971).
I vote to vacate the judgment.