56 F. 129 | U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Maryland | 1893
This equity suit was instituted in 1876 hy the complainant, who was a citizen of Massachusetts, against the respondents, who were citizens of Maryland, to obtain an accounting of a trust created hy the will of Thomas Sewell, late of Baltimore city, deceased. By a decree passed 33th June, 1877, Edward Otis Hinkley was appointed trustee to execute the trusts created by said will in respect to the share of Mrs. Wade, the complainant, who was a life tenant, and such proceedings were had that a decree was entered in favor of Mr. Hinkley, as trustee, January 11, 1883, against the respondents, for the sum of $9,452.91, money due hy them to the trust estate. This decree remains unsatisfied, and the complainant, Mrs. Wade, having died without children, the persons who hy said will, and hy the contingent and cross remainders, are either immediately or contingently hene-fieallv interested in the said trust fund, are numerous, and are some of them citizens of Maryland, and some of them citizens of other states. In 1891, Richard Sewell, one of the respondents and one of the judgment debtors, under the decree of this court, applied for the benefit of the Maryland insolvent laws, and was discharged on June 20, 3891, from all his debts and contracts.
In December, 1892, certain real estate in Baltimore was conveyed to the said Richard Sewell, and upon his attempting to sell, and convey it to a purchaser, objection was made that the decree of this court of January 11, 1883, for $9,452.91, might he held to he
I think this is clearly a case of resulting trust, such as arises by operation of law when one party pays the whole purchase money for real estate, and the title is conveyed to another. Ollcott v. Bynum, 17 Wall. 44; Dorsey v. Clarke, 4 Har. & J. 556; Purdy v. Purdy, 3 Md. Ch. 547; Bank v. Snively, 23 Md. 253; Keller v. Keller, 45 Md. 269. It being established that the whole beneficial interest in the property belonged to Singer, who paid the purchase money, there is no interest in Sewell to which the lien of the decree can attach. Hartsock v. Russell, 52 Md. 619.
I am of the opinion also that the discharge of Sewell under the state insolvent laws operated to discharge his liability as judgment debtor under the decree of this court. Mr. Justice Clifford, in Baldwin v. Hale, 1 Wall. 234, has summarized the grounds of the decisions with regard to the want of extraterritorial effect of state insolvent laws. He says:
“Insolvent laws of one state cannot, discharge the contracts of citizens of other states, because they have no extraterritorial operation, and consequently the tribunal sitting under them, unless in cases where a citizen of such other state voluntarily becomes a party to the proceedings, has no jurisdiction of the case. Legal notice cannot be given, and consequently there can be no obligation to appear, and, of course, no legal default.”
In the present case, the legal title to the judgment debt was in Mr. Hinkley, who had been substituted by decree in the place and stead of the trustees to whom the trust property had been devised by the will. He, and he alone, had the right to enforce the decree. He alone had the power to give an acquittance, and enter the decree satisfied. He stood'in the place of, and represented, all the persons who have any interest, immediate or contingent, in the fund. If it had been desirable to prove the debt, and receive any dividend derivable from the insolvent estate, he would have been the proper person to prove the debt, to vote for choice of. a permanent trustee, and receive the dividend. Ex parte Norwood, 3 Biss. 504, Ex parte Green, 2 Deac. & C. 116.
