In re the Estate of Knight

12 Cal. 200 | Cal. | 1859

Baldwin, J.,

delivered the opinion of the Court—Terry, C. J., concurring.

This is unquestionably a hard ■ case on the administrator, for he seems to have acted in good faith. But we cannot relax or set aside the rules of law to suit the exigencies of particular cases, or relieve individual instances of hardship.

The statutes of this State do not allow an administrator to pay even the debts’due by an intestate except in a particular way. Certainly they do not allow him to pay money not due by an intestate, upon an idea that the payment might be beneficial to the estate. He is to take care of, manage and preserve the estate committed to him; but this does not mean that he is, at discretion, to pay off all incumbrances resting on the property, upon the notion that the property may increase in value, and thereby a speculation may be made for the estate. If this were so, an administrator might consume all the assets of the estate in clearing the title to a portion of the property, and then the property might turn out to be valueless or worth but little. If a case should arise in which a great sacrifice would ensue unless money were paid to discharge an incumbrance, it is not impossible that a Court of Chancery might order the expenditure of the money needed to remove such incumbrance. The rule of equity is, that a trustee has a right, in questions of responsibility and difficulty, to seek the direction of a Court of Chancery, touching his conduct in the trust, and that the decree of the Court is a protection to him. But if he undertakes to go beyond the strict line of his duty as the law defines it, he acts upon his own responsibility, and while he can receive no profit from a successful issue of his investment, he must bear the loss of a failure. It would be a most dangerous precedent to hold that an administrator may speculate with the funds of the estate, or pay charges not allowed by law, though solely with a view of benefiting the estate, and then throw the loss upon the estate, and assign his good intentions as a defense to the injurious consequences of his acts.

The administrator, in the absence of special authority, must administer the estate as he finds it, paying taxes and other necessary expenses, and doing such other acts as are necessary to preserve it as left; he cannot advance money to remove incumbrances, unless his intestate was bound to pay the money. If he takes the responsibility of improving the estate, or bettering the title in this way, it must be at his own risk. The loss cannot be visited upon the heirs, who gave him no authority to cause it. Nor can he ask legal protection, when he has himself, though with the best motives, gone beyond the provisions of the law.

The decree of the Probate Court is affirmed.