274 N.W. 621 | Minn. | 1937
The statute of limitations relating to the commencement of actions does not apply to the filing and presenting of claims in probate. O'Mulcahey v. Gragg,
"The statute of limitations did not apply to proceedings to enforce claims against the estates of deceased persons, but only to actions. * * * Such claims must be presented and proved in *472 the manner prescribed by the statute. So that, when not fixed by the probate court limiting the time for presenting claims, there was, prior to the Probate Code, no statute which barred a claim, not barred at the time of the death, no matter how long after the death it might be presented. In these cases the claims were not presented till 14 years after the death. So far as any statute bars the right to present them, it would have been the same had they been presented 50 years after the death."
It was held however that the claims were barred by laches.
The probate code adopted in 1889 remained in force until the adoption of the present probate code. Section 107 of the probate code of 1889 was in substantially the same language as the same section in the present code. L. 1889, c. 46, § 107. See 2 Mason Minn. St. 1927, § 8815. It was adopted to limit the time within which claims not barred during the lifetime of the decedent might be asserted against his estate. It remedied the situation disclosed in O'Mulcahey v. Gragg,
The contention of the administrator that the claims are barred by § 9191(1) is not sustained. The probate code is complete in itself insofar as it fixes the time within which claims against estates may be filed or barred. By § 103 no claim which was barred during the lifetime of the deceased may be allowed. By § 107 a claim not barred during the lifetime of the deceased is required to be filed within five years after his death, and within the time limited by the order of the probate court for the filing of claims under § 100. In this case the claims were not barred during the lifetime of the decedent. His death took the claims out of the general statute of limitations and made them subject to § 107 of the probate code. *473 The claims were filed within the five years allowed by that section and within the time limited for the filing of claims by the order of the probate court. They were properly allowed.
The judgment is affirmed.