39 A.2d 605 | Pa. | 1944
Appellee, The Union Trust Company of Pittsburgh, Administrator of the Estate of Herman E. Plogstert, deceased, has no substantive right in these proceedings which requires judicial protection. It is insisting upon nothing more than a formal employment by the Orphans' Court of procedural mechanisms which, while ordinarily desirable, are of no practical value under the facts here involved.
Decedent died intestate August 2, 1942, leaving to survive him as sole heir his mother Louise Scheiber. The Union Trust Company of Pittsburgh was appointed administrator of his estate and notice of the granting of the letters of administration was immediately published as required by law. An inventory was filed, followed on April 5, 1943, by a first and final account which was duly advertised and was audited on April 21, 1943. No claims of creditors being presented, on April 26, 1943, a decree was entered awarding to Louise Scheiber the entire balance for distribution amounting to $7,659.71. Shortly thereafter Louise Scheiber discovered that decedent had on deposit with the Harmony Building and Loan Association the sum of $7,534.04, — an asset which had not *476 been included in the inventory or the administrator's account. She paid the inheritance tax due thereon, and then petitioned the court for an order directing the Building and Loan Association to transfer the deposit to her; the court, on July 31, 1943, made the order requested. On August 3, 1943, she assigned all her right, title and interest in the fund to her minor grandson Charles Raymond Dudt, and the Building and Loan Association issued to him its pass book covering the deposit account. On January 14, 1944, the administrator filed a petition praying that the court's order of July 31, 1943, be revoked and that the Building and Loan Association be directed to make payment to it as administrator. On May 16, 1944, the court entered such a decree, from which the present appeals were taken by Louise Scheiber and by the guardian of the minor grandson.
We start with the familiar principle that although the legal title to the assets of a decedent's estate passes to the administrator, if there be no creditors the heirs have a complete equity in the property and distribution may be made among them without administration. The cases so holding are legion.1 Obviously, if there are no creditors of this decedent's estate, it would be a vain and useless thing to have the Building and Loan Association pay the $7,534.04 to the administrator, have the latter file a supplemental account, have the court enter another decree re-awarding this asset to Louise Scheiber, and have her re-assign it to her grandson. The only result of such a procedure would be to diminish the amount of the fund by the payment of administrator's *477 commissions and counsel fees; these should never be the reward of other than necessary services. The law is essentially pragmatic; it is concerned primarily with the objective to be attained, and it should not be so construed as to require the retracing of one procedural road merely in order to pursue another more conventional one to the same legal terminus.
Presumably the administrator does not dissent from what has thus been said, but it argues that unless the asset in question is turned over to it and a second account is filed and advertised it cannot be conclusively determined whether or not there are creditors of decedent's estate. Appellants, on the other hand, point out that the administrator's petition does not allege the existence of any such creditors2 whereas they themselves assert in their answers that there are none; therefore the burden of proof is upon the administrator. The solution of this controversy is to be found in our decisions inRay's Estate,
The order or decree of May 16, 1944, is reversed, and the order or decree of July 31, 1943, is reinstated; each party to pay its or their respective costs.
