47 Vt. 502 | Vt. | 1874
The opinion of the court was delivered by
The referee does not, in terms, find that the distri- . bution of the estate of Charles B. Colman was subsequent to the marriage of the plaintiffs. He finds that they were married September 5, 1868; that Charles B. Colman, the father of Mary A. White, deceased in 1867; and that after her marriage, Mary A. White received from her father’s estate $1,122.23, less the revenue tax. From these facts, we think that the distribution of Colman’s estate may fairly be inferred to have been made subsequently to the marriage of the plaintiffs. The counsel on both sides, in argument, have assumed that such was the fact. We therefore conclude that the distribution of the father’s estate was made during the coverture of the plaintiff wife. Hence, the money and other personal property received by her from that distribution, are within the operation and protection of the act of 1867, p. 949, Gen. Sts. While the right to a distributive share in her father’s estate became vested in the daughter immediately upon the father’s decease, and she became possessed of an undivided portion of the property of the estate, subject to the rights of the administrator to use a part of the same for the payment of the debts and expenses of administration, yet, the particular property did not become absolutely vested in her, until the decree of the probate court making distribution of the estate, became absolute.