160 N.E. 347 | Ill. | 1928
This appeal is from a judgment of the circuit court of Cook county in a proceeding under section 2 of an act to declare the heirship of deceased persons, (Smith's Stat. 1927, p. 93,) which declares that appellee, Sheldon W. Crilley, is the nephew and only heir of Mary Crilley Sterling French, decedent. The case originated in the probate court of Cook county and the finding there was the same. The appeal is prosecuted to this court by Elizabeth J. Sugrue and Margaret McKay, appellants, who are first cousins of decedent, on the ground that a constitutional question is involved.
John James Crilley, the only brother of decedent, was married April 30, 1887, to Annie McDonald, the mother of appellee. Appellee was born August 18, 1892, at the home of Annie's parents in Lubec, Maine. In the fall of 1893 Annie took her baby and went to Winthrop, Massachusetts, *460 where she began living with Sheldon W. Cook. Appellee remained in this home as a member of the family and was recognized by Cook and known in the community as his son. Crilley died December 2, 1907, Annie Crilley July 18, 1908, and Sheldon W. Cook January 23, 1917.
When J.J. Crilley died he left a small estate, consisting principally of bank deposits, totaling about $2000. About six months after his death his sister began proceedings in the probate court of Middlesex county, Massachusetts, to administer his estate and filed a petition to have herself appointed administratrix. In this petition she stated that he left a widow, Annie, and a son, Sheldon, as his only heirs. She questioned the paternity of Sheldon, and employed a Boston attorney, F.G. Cook, to represent her. Upon investigation he learned that Crilley's wife had left him about the time a son was born to her, and that subsequently she lived with S.W. Cook, an insurance solicitor, as his wife. The attorney visited S.W. Cook at his office and from him ascertained that Crilley's wife had survived Crilley but that she died about six months after his death. After this interview attorney Cook went to Lubec, Maine, where he found a birth certificate showing the birth of Sheldon W.R. Crilley on August 18, 1892. This investigation was completed in 1911, when Sheldon was about nineteen years old. S.W. Cook believed Sheldon to be his son and had treated him as such from birth. He was anxious to establish that Sheldon was his son, and he did not want him to receive, directly or indirectly through his mother, any of the estate of Crilley. He began proceedings April 2, 1912, to administer the estate of Annie Crilley Cook, and stated in his petition that she left surviving as her only heirs, Sheldon W., her husband, and Sheldon W., a minor son. April 25, 1912, he filed in the Crilley estate an affidavit as administrator of the estate of Annie Crilley Cook, suggesting to the court that Crilley did not leave a son named Sheldon, and that his only heir and next of kin was Mary Crilley Sterling *461 French. In the fall of 1913, after Sheldon had reached his majority, in order to carry out the plan to disclaim any interest in the estate of John J. Crilly, he executed an assignment to Mary French of all interest which he might have in the money received by the estate of his mother from the estate of Crilley, and he also executed an assignment to the administrator of the estate of Annie Crilley Cook of all interest which he might have in the estate of Crilley, stating that he was the person referred to as Sheldon Crilley in the petition filed June 16, 1909, in said estate. After these assignments were executed both estates were closed.
Appellants contend that in these proceedings it was adjudged that Sheldon is not the son of John J. Crilley, and that under the full faith and credit clause of the Federal constitution the courts of Illinois are bound by this adjudication. Aside from the legal questions involved, this contention is without merit because the court did not find that Sheldon was not the son of Crilley. In each case Sheldon made an assignment to Mary French of whatever interest he had in the estates, and the court in each instance acted upon this assignment. Attorney Cook says that these documents were signed September 25, 1913, after full explanation of the contents and effect. Sheldon says they were signed in 1911 at the direction of S.W. Cook and without his knowledge of their contents. Whatever the facts, it is clear that these documents are not binding except with respect to the closing of the estates in which they were filed. The most that can be said for them is that they are admissions against interest, but under the circumstances little weight should be attached to these admissions.
When Sheldon W. Cook died he left a will, in which he referred to Sheldon as his son and made him the chief beneficiary of his estate. Sheldon qualified as executor under the name Sheldon W. Cook, and in the petition to admit the will to record designated himself as a son and heir of Sheldon W. Cook, deceased. The will was proved and letters *462
testamentary were issued to Sheldon and distribution was made in accordance with the will. It is contended that in this proceeding it was adjudicated that Sheldon is the son of Cook and that this adjudication is binding upon the courts of this State. Conceding that it was necessary to find that Sheldon was the son of Cook in order to admit the will to record and distribute the estate accordingly, it does not follow that that finding estops Sheldon to show the truth in another proceeding. What the court decided was that it had jurisdiction of the estate of Cook, that Cook's will was entitled to be admitted to record, and that the persons named in the will were entitled to the property of which Cook died possessed. The finding that Sheldon was Cook's son, if such a finding was made, was only incidental to the primary object of the proceeding, which was the distribution of the estate of Cook. So far as the adjudication operated on the res, the judgment concluded both the parties to the proceeding and all others, but the findings upon which the judgment was predicated do not conclude strangers to the record. (American Woolen Co. v. Lesher,
Sheldon enlisted in the army of the United States in 1916 and at that time stated that Sheldon W. Cook was his father. He served in France during the World War, and later the State of Massachusetts provided by law for the payment of a gratuity to its citizens who had served in the American Expeditionary Forces. July 39, 1919, Sheldon made application, under oath, for this gratuity, and in his application stated that his mother was dead and that his father was Sheldon W. Cook, of Winthrop, Massachusetts. This proves nothing except that he assumed Cook was his father, and under the circumstances of this case that assumption was fully justified.
A proceeding was brought in Maine by Cook to administer the estate of Sheldon's mother, and in this proceeding it was alleged that Cook was her surviving husband and Sheldon her son. All that was found in that case concerning the parentage of Sheldon was that he was the son of Annie. The relation of Sheldon to Cook was not in *464
question and there was no adjudication upon it. Stone v.Salisbury,
At the time Sheldon was born his mother was lawfully married to John J. Crilley and that state had continued for more than five years. Under such circumstances the presumption is that her husband was the father of her child, (Drennan v. Douglas,
As against this evidence appellants offered to prove by F.G. Cook what Sheldon W. Cook had told him in November, 1911, when he confronted him with the fact that proceedings had been begun to administer the estate of John J. Crilley and that Sheldon had been named as a son and heir of Crilley. Pedigree may be proved by hearsay evidence, but it seems to be well settled that a declaration concerning kinship reproduced as hearsay, to be admissible, must have been made by a person, since deceased, before a controversy arose, and who was related by blood or affinity to some branch of the family the pedigree respecting which is in question. (Jarchow v. Grosse,
There are other bits of evidence in the record, but if full credit be given to all of the competent evidence which to any degree tends to prove that Sheldon is the son of Cook, it is not enough to overcome the direct and positive evidence that Crilley was the lawful husband of Sheldon's mother at the time he was born and that he had access to her at the time when, according to the laws of nature, the mother became pregnant. The competent evidence in this record clearly establishes that Sheldon is the son of John J. Crilley and therefore the nephew of decedent.
There is nothing in the judgments of the courts of Massachusetts or Maine to bar the judgment entered in this case, and it is therefore affirmed.
Judgment affirmed. *467