195 A. 732 | Conn. | 1937
According to the finding the plaintiff owned a note secured by a mortgage executed by Samuel Z. Field in the amount of $56,000, dated May 1st, 1918, and payable on or before twenty years after date, with a provision that interest was to be paid semi-annually and that if any payment should remain in default for fifteen days after it was due the principal should immediately become due at the option of the holder. Field died February 19th, 1934, and at that time the interest was fully paid up. The defendant is executor of Field's estate. The Court of Probate limited six months from March 7th, 1934, for the presentation of claims. The executor paid the interest due on the mortgage debt on May 1st, 1934, but default was made on the payment due on November 1st, 1934. The plaintiff presented no claim against the estate within the time limited by the probate order. He did not know that the law required the Court of Probate to limit a time for the presentation of claims or that the court had made such a limitation or that there was anything he could or should do to protect his rights or that he had a presentable claim based on the mortgage, as he did. Roth v. Ravich,
In determining whether an extension of time to present claims should be granted, the Court of Probate ordinarily exercises a discretion and the Superior Court reviews its action only to determine whether that discretion has been legally and reasonably exercised. Reiley v. Healey,
Previous to 1899 the statute requiring the presentation of claims against a solvent estate of a deceased person within a time fixed by the Court of Probate contained no exception. Cone v. Dunham,
The question of the right of the court to extend the time for presenting a particular claim against a solvent estate cannot be considered apart from the provision in 4914 permitting a general extension for the presentation of claims "for cause shown," "not exceeding the period which it might have originally limited," and that in 4925 permitting an extension of time for presenting a claim against an insolvent estate "for good and sufficient cause shown" "not exceeding thirty days beyond the time it might have originally limited;" for if plaintiff's ignorance of the law in this case justified an extension, a similar situation would justify it under these other provisions.
If a plaintiff's ignorance that, if he was to secure payment of the indebtedness to him upon the basis of the decedent's personal liability, he must present the claim, is to be regarded as a cause for extension, it is difficult to see why in any case ignorance of a creditor *364
that he must present a claim in order to secure payment of the debt of a deceased debtor would not also constitute such a cause. Nor is it possible to distinguish such ignorance from ignorance that a time had been duly fixed by the Court of Probate for the presentation of claims followed by the requisite notice; for, as we said in Home Owners' Loan Corp. v. Sears, Roebuck Co.,
In Buzzell v. Aetna Indemnity Co.,
It is true that equity will often relieve against mistakes of law, but the cases in our court where such relief has been granted go no further, in the absence of some independent equity, than to grant relief in that class of cases where there has not been a mere error of law but that error is the underlying cause of a mistake of fact. 2 Pomeroy, Equity Jurisprudence (4th Ed.) 849. Thus in Park Brothers Co., Ltd. v. Blodgett Clapp Co.,
The plaintiff calls attention to Northrop v. Graves,
In Usher v. Waddingham,
While the question whether the plaintiff's ignorance of the law requiring the presentation of the claim would be a ground which equity would recognize as a basis for some appropriate relief is not of course determinative of the question of the intention of the Legislature in requiring that cause be shown as a basis for granting an extension of time to present a claim, yet the cases dealing with it are sufficiently analogous to afford considerable light. Where to them is added the history and purpose of the provision and the practical considerations to which we have referred, we are brought to the conclusion that the plaintiff's mere ignorance of the fact that his claim was one which should be presented is not cause for granting him an extension of time. Roaf v. Knight,
There is error, the judgment is set aside and the case remanded to the Superior Court with direction to dismiss the appeal.
In this opinion the other judges concurred.