23 Ohio St. 3d 198 | Ohio | 1986
Ohio’s mortmain statute, former R.C. 2107.06,
“(A) If a testator dies leaving issue and by his will devises or bequeaths his estate, or any part thereof, in trust or otherwise to any * * * person, association, or corporation for the use or benefit of one or more benevolent, religious, educational, or charitable purposes, such devises and bequests shall be valid in their entirety only if the testator’s will was executed more than six months prior to the death of the testator. If such will was executed within six months of the testator’s death, such devises and bequests shall be valid to the extent they do not in the aggregate exceed twenty-five per cent of the value of the testator’s net probate estate, and in the event the aggregate of the devises and bequests exceeds twenty-five per cent thereof, such devises and bequests shall be abated proportionately so that the aggregate thereof equals twenty-five per cent of the value of the testator’s net probate estate. * *
“(C) The portion of any such devises and bequests which is invalid under this section shall be distributed per stirpes among such testator’s issue * *
It is undisputed that four of the beneficiaries under Myrtle Davis’ last will — the Salvation Army, Fairfield Church of God, Shriners’ Hospital for Crippled Children, and Twin Wells Indian School — are organized for “benevolent, religious, educational, or charitable” purposes within the meaning of former R.C. 2107.06; and, the record indicates that the assets of Davis’ estate are sufficient, after payment of all debts and expenses of administration, to pay these beneficiaries more than twenty-five percent of the net probate estate. By operation of R.C. 2107.06, the bequests to
The appellees, Shriners, Hester and Twin Wells Indian School, contend that former R.C. 2107.06 should not be applied to Davis’ last will, because application of the statute would alter Davis’ will in a manner that is contrary to her wishes and would unreasonably deprive certain of her intended beneficiaries of the gifts to which they would otherwise be entitled. Shriners urges the court either to adopt the doctrine of dependent relative revocation (in order that Davis’ revoked will of January 31, 1980 can be given effect), or to hold that former R.C. 2107.06 is violative of the Equal Protection and Free Exercise Clauses of the Ohio and United States Constitutions.
Focusing, first, on Shriners’ challenge to the constitutionality of former R.C. 2107.06, we look to the purpose of the statute. Modern mortmain statutes
Traditional scrutiny of R.C. 2107.06 for purposes of equal protection analysis requires a determination as to whether the statute is rationally related to the accomplishment of a legitimate state objective. McGowan v. Maryland (1961), 366 U.S. 420 [17 O.O.2d 151]; Bd. of Edn. v. Walter (1979), 58 Ohio St. 2d 368 [12 O.O.3d 327]; Kinney v. Kaiser Aluminum & Chemical Corp. (1975), 41 Ohio St. 2d 120 [70 O.O.2d 206]. We believe that the protection of a testator’s issue from disinheritance, as a result of the testator’s unsound judgment or the undue influence of third parties upon the testator, is a legitimate state objective. Our analysis narrows, therefore, to the question of whether R.C. 2107.06 is rationally related to the accomplishment of that objective.
It is apparent that R.C. 2107.06 will accomplish its objective in some
Thus, by operation of R.C. 2107.06, a select class of beneficiaries is deprived of testamentary bequests, even though in the vast majority of cases such bequests are entirely legitimate and not within the scope of the statute’s objective. Additionally, R.C. 2107.06 effectively creates an irrebuttable presumption that a testator, who made substantial “charitable” bequests in a will that was executed within six months prior to his death, acted with unsound judgment or under undue influence. Such “ ‘irrebuttable presumptions have long been disfavored under the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments,’ expecially when they are ‘not necessarily or universally true in fact, and when the state has reasonable alternative means of making the crucial determination.’ ” Hall v. Rosen (1977), 50 Ohio St. 2d 135, at 142 [4 O.O.3d 336] (Justice William B. Brown, dissenting, quoting Vlandis v. Kline [1973], 412 U.S. 411, 446 and 452). Although Shriners has not directly challenged the validity of R.C. 2107.06 on due process grounds, the creation of the aforementioned irrebuttable presumption, in spite of the existence of “reasonable alternative means” for determining whether the testator acted with unsound judgment or under undue influence,
Additional evidence of the unreasonable character of R.C. 2107.06 is found in the requirement that charitable bequests in excess of twenty-five percent of the value of the testator’s net probate estate be “distributed per stirpes among such testator’s issue.” In the instant case, the trial court found that Davis’ issue — her grandchildren — were, “from a practical standpoint, * * * strangers to the testatrix.” The statute thus operates to invalidate legitimate gifts to worthy organizations solely for the benefit of persons who were neither dependent upon nor closely involved with the life of the testatrix. When Ohio’s first mortmain statute was enacted in the nineteenth century, families were usually supported by
The imprecise nature of R.C. 2107.06 is further borne out by its failure to address inter-vivos death-bed transfers that are made to the prejudice of the grantor’s issue and bequests made by terminally ill testators more than six months before their death. Additionally, the statute’s invalidation of bequests for governmental, benevolent, religious, educational and charitable purposes appears grossly unfair in view of its failure to address bequests, which are not designated for any of the foregoing purposes, to persons such as clergymen, physicians, attorneys and nurses. Persons in these positions are often in a position to influence the death-bed testator; and, bequests to such persons in their individual capacities lack the “facial legitimacy” of bequests that are expressly designated for “charitable” purposes.
Based upon all of the foregoing, we cannot conclude that former R.C. 2107.06 is rationally related to the accomplishment of a legitimate state objective. The legislature apparently reached a similar conclusion when it repealed R.C. 2107.06 effective August 1, 1985. Although this court upheld the constitutionality of a predecessor to R.C. 2107.06 in Patton v. Patton (1883), 39 Ohio St. 590, it did so by rejecting a challenge to the statute that was based upon the First Amendment right to acquire, possess and protect one’s property.
According to the brief of the appellee Attorney General, only four states “currently have valid mortmain statutes.”
Based upon this holding we decline to address Shriners’ challenge to R.C. 2107.06 under the Free Exercise Clauses of the Ohio and United States Constitutions. We also decline to adopt or address the doctrine of dependent relative revocation.
Accordingly, the judgment of the court of appeals is affirmed, but for the reasons stated herein, and the cause is remanded to the trial court for further proceedings.
Judgment affirmed and cause remanded.
R.C. 2107.06 was repealed in its entirety effective August 1, 1985.
Mortmain originally came into being as a means of preventing the acquisition of vast amounts of real property by religious orders, which would be inclined to hold such property in perpetuity, under a “dead hand,” thereby preventing the economic and efficient use of land.
R.C. 2107.71 et seq. provide for a will contest in which the complaining party may show that the testator, pursuant to R.C. 2107.02, lacked the requisite mental capacity or was under restraint at the time of the execution of his will.
The court held that “the inalienable rights here declared [of ‘acquiring, possessing and protecting property’], * * * are possessed by living, not by dead men.” Patton v. Patton, supra, at 597.
Fla. Stat. Ann. Section 732.803 (West Supp. 1986); Ga. Code Ann. Section 113-107 (Supp. 1985); Idaho Code Section 15-2-615 (1979); Miss. Code Ann. Section 91-5-31 (1972).
The court of appeals remanded this cause to the trial court for application of the doctrine of dependent relative revocation, which would allow the religious, educational, and charitable bequests in Davis’ revoked will of January 31, 1980 to be revived. “Under * * * [this] doctrine * * *, an earlier will, revoked only to give effect to a later one on the supposition that the later one will become effective, remains in effect to the extent that the later proves ineffective.” Estate of Kaufman (1945), 25 Cal. 2d 854, 858-859, 155 P. 2d 831, 833.