25 Gratt. 507 | Va. | 1874
This cause is before us upon an appeal allowed to a decree of the Circuit court of Frederick county. A statement of the following facts is necessary to a proper understanding of the case, and the application of the principles of law which must govern it.
On the 2d day of June 1858, James 1L Hite, Sr., sold to his two sons, J. Irvine Hite and J. Madison Hite, his farm, lying in Clarke county, containing about seven hundred acres, for the sum of §45 per acre. One-eighth of the purchase money was to be paid on the 1st day of January 1859, and one-eighth annually thereafter, until one moiety should be paid; one-eighth of the other moiety was to be paid at the death of the wife of the said James M. Hite, Sr.; and one-eighth annually thereafter, until the whole should be paid, when the purchasers were to have a deed for the land; the interest on the whole amount to he paid annually, from the 1st day of January 1859.
Hite died in the latter part of the year 1859, having made and published his last will and testament, which was duly admitted to probate and record in the County court of Frederick county. By this will the sum of' five thousand dollars was directed to he applied to the
In November 1859, the two sons of the testator, who had become the joint owners of the land under the purchase referred to, by agreement between themselves, appointed certain persons to make an equal division of the land between them, and, in January 1860, executed a deed of partition, whereby they conveyed in severalty to each other the portions which had been respectively allotted to them in said division.
At the death of the testator between two and three thousand dollars had been paid on account of the purchase money for the land. The whole balance amounting, at the death of the testator, to the sum of nearly thirty thousand dollars, remained unpaid, and for that balance the land stood as security for its payment; for, by the terms of the contract of sale, the title was to be withheld until the whole of the purchase money was paid. The debts of the estate were ■so inconsiderable that it was not necessary to collect any part of this fund for the payment of the testator’s debts.
The great bulk, if not the whole of the testator’s -estate, consisted of this fund in the hands of his two
In October or November of the year 1862, Irvine Hite having received what he considered an advantageous offer for the portion of the land allotted to him, in the division between himself and his brother, applied to the executor to know whether he would receive Confederate money for the debt due from him to his father’s estate.
The executor, after communicating with James M. Hite, and obtaining his assent in his own right, and as trustee for Mrs. Baker, to receive that currency in payment of their legacies, and after making an ineffectual attempt to obtain the assent of Skinker and wife, agreed with Irvine Hite that he would receive Confedérate money in payment of the debt he owed to his father’s estate. Accordingly, on the 24th day of November 1862, the sum of $19,234.12 (that being the price agreed upon between Irvine Hite and Wood, the purchaser of the land,) was paid to the executor in Confederate treasury notes, and a deed executed on that day by Hite and wife, and the executor, Williams, was delivered to Wood.
Out of this fund, thus received, the executor paid over to J. Madison Hite, in his own right and as trustee for Mrs. Baker, the respective proportions due them as the devisees and legatees of his testator. The proportion due to Mrs. Skinker remained in his hands, and failing to hear from Skinker, who was in the army, or Mrs. Skinker, who was in a distant part of the state, and for a long time within the lines of the
Thus matters stood until after the close of the war, when, in February 1866, Skinker and wife' filed their bill in the Circuit court of Frederick against the executor and legatees of James M. Hite, Sr., Irvine Hite» and the purchaser of the land from him, in which they claim that they are entitled to one-third of the estate of James M. Hite, after payment of his debts; that this legacy to Mrs. Skinker was secured by a lien upon valuable real estate; that they have never received any part of that legacy thus secured; that they had never executed any transfer, release or acquittance for the'same, or any part thereof; nor given any consent or sanction, or done any other act tending to impair their right to the legacy, or any lien for the same; and they ask for such decree as may be necessary for payment of whatever sum may be justly due them, and for enforcing the same by sale of the lands or otherwise.
To this bill the defendants all answered. The only answer necessary to be noticed is that of the executor, Williams, which will be more particularly referred to presently. After the answers of all the defendants were in the cause, the executor filed a cross-bill by leave of the court, which he denominates a cross-bill for discovery, in which he charges that Skinker and wife knew of the sale made by Irvine Hite to Charles Wood as early as 1868, and neither of them informed said Williams, the executor, of their dissent or opposition to said sale; that said Thomas J. Skinker passed through Winchester, where executor resided, some
To this cross-bill Skinker and wife answered, that Mrs. Skinker heard of the sale from Irvine Hite to Wood as early as Hovember 1862, but had no communication with Mr. Williams, the executor, on the subject; that Thomas Skinker heard of the sale at the same time, but was in the federal lines, and could make no answer to Mr. Williams’ letter on the subject for want of mail facilities; that Thomas J. Skinker was a prisoner in Washington for some time in the spring of 1863, and was in a very critical state of health during the greater part of th'e war from a serious wound and other causes; that he did pass through Winchester just after the battle of Gettysburg, under military orders not to leave the ranks, and a few days thereafter returned from Williamsport through Winchester on the Sabbath, prostrated from sickness, and was ordered immediately to a hospital at Staunton. Such was the nature of the cross-bill and the answer thereto.
Depositions of numerous witnesses were taken to show that at the period when the land was sold by Irvine Hite, and at the time the Confederate money was received by the executor, that currency was the only currency in circulation, and that it was received
In September, 1868, the case came on to be heard upon the bill and answers, the cross-bill for discovery and answer thereto, and the depositions of witnesses, and the court reserving certain questions for future adjudication, decreed “that the defendants, John J. and James H. Williams, administrators with the will annexed of Philip Williams, deceased, out'of the assets of said testator, in their hands, do pay to the complainants (Skinker and wife) the sum of four thousand nine hundred and eighty-nine dollars and fifty-five cents, with interest thereon at the rate of six per centum per annum, from the 24th day of November, 1862, until paid, and when paid, to be a credit pro tanto upon the executorial account of James M. Hite’s estate.” It is from this decree that an appeal has been allowed to this court.
The grave and important questions arising in this case (in the form in which they are presented here) are now before this court for the first time. In the numerous and multifarious cases growing out of dealings in Confederate currency, and contracts made with reference to that currency, the question has not yet been definitively adjudicated as to how far or under what circumstances an executor may be 'excused or justified in receiving a depreciated currency for a gold debt, well secured, without incurring a liability for a devastavit. This question we have to meet for the first time in this case. I do not deem it necessary, for the purpose of my conclusions, to refer to matters put in issue by the pleadings, or to the disputed facts. I shall ground my opinion upon the conceded facts in the cause, and upon those only. What are those facts ? It must be conceded—1st. That Mrs. Skinker is entitled,
These are the undisputed and conceded facts in the cause; and the question arises upon these facts, whether the executor receiving this debt, well secured upon real estate, in a currency depreciated to nearly one-half its nominal value, without the consent of the legatee to whom it was to be paid, has incurred a responsibility for which he is personally liable; in other words, whether to the extent of receiving the proportion of the debt due to Mrs. Skinker, without her consent, he has committed a devastavit. It must be conceded also that no man knew better than Mr.
The result of this communication was that the executor obtained the consent of two of the legatees to receive their proportion of the legacies due them in Confederate money. But he never did obtain the consent of Skinker and wife; and after waiting for some time and making ineffectual attempts to get their consent, he deliberately took upon himself the responsibility of receiving it without their consent. He knew that in doing this he was incurring the risk of a refusal upon the part of Skinker and wife, and he sought to protect himself against that risk (in receiving Confederate money for them without their consent) by taking
It is manifest, therefore, both from the answer of the executor, as well as from the letter addressed to -James M. Hite, above quoted, that he was convinced that, in his own language, “ it was not proper for him to re
It is not necessary, in order to subject an executor to personal liability, to show that he acted fraudulently. He is subjected by law to liability, personally, for various acts of misconduct, amounting to a violation or neglect of duty, and which is called in law a devastavit, or wasting of the assets. An executor may commit a devastavit by such acts of negligence or careless administration as defeats the rights of creditors, or legatees, or parties entitled to distribution. 2 Lomax’s ex’ors 475-77-485, and cases there cited.
It is a proposition too plain to require the citation of authority to support it, that where an executor releases a debt due to his testator, or cancels or delivers to the obligor a bond, of which the testator was obligee, this will charge him to the amount of the debt; and so if he releases a part of the debt, or can
The able counsel for the appellants seeking to relieve the executor in this cause, from the stress of those well settled rules of law which declare what constitutes a devastavit, and fixes a personal liability upon an executor, labored to show that the executor in receiving from Irvine Hite Confederate currency, benefited the estate, because the security for the debt was doubtful, inasmuch as the .debts due from Madison ■ and Irvine Hite exceeded the value of the land. They submit a statement in figures, by which they show that the debt secured by lien on the land amounted to $32,728.27, while the value of the land (after deducting a small portion sold to Bowen) was $31,644.03; showing an excess of debt over value of land of $1,084.24. And it is argued that while the debt was increasing by the accumulated interest, the land was [subject to be greatly'depreciated by the fact that it lay within a region much exposed to the casualties of war and the depredations of contending armies; and that the buildings, fences and timber were in constant danger of destruction; and that therefore the security for the debt was doubtful, and the executor was justified in collecting it in a depreciated currency. It is a sufficient answer to this view to note the fact that one-third of the debts secured upon the real estate, went, under the will, to J. M. Hite, and that in point of fact the amount due the estate, which the executor was charged with collecting, was only two-thirds of the amount estimated as the debt secured on the land, to wit: the sum of $21,818.84; so that in point of fact, there was a debt of $21,818.84 secured by lien on land worth at least $31,644.03;
But it is insisted by the learned counsel for the appellants that the executor acted in good faith, himself believing that it was best for the estate, and those entitled to • distribution, that the debt should be collected; and that upon the principles settled by this court in Davis, comm’r v. Harman and in Myers’ ex’or v. Zetelle, 21 Gratt. 194, 733, he ought to be excused from all liability. As has been observed before, the question how far, or under what circumstances an executor may be excused or justified in receiving Confederate money, greatly depreciated, for a gold debt well secured upon real estate, without incurring liability for a devastavit has never been settled by this court. Nor is it necessary to charge an executor for a devastavit to show that he has acted fraudulently, or shown mala jides in his administration of the estate. The cases relied upon involved very different questions from the case at bar. In the one case, Davis v. Harman, a commissioner of the court who had in his hands certain funds, claimed by contesting parties, was directed to hold the fund until the rights of the parties could be litigated. He put the fund in bank and there it perished, not in consequence of the deposit, but in consequence of “the sudden and irretrievable destruction of the whole currency of the country by the termination of a civil war, which had destroyed the very power that created it.” The court held that the commissioner had incurred no personal liability.
The case of Myers v. Zetelle, 21 Gratt. 733, rested upon the peculiar facts of that case. The pivotal
“ The evacuation of Richmond was an event that
‘iBut let it be conceded that these agents did commit errorB of judgment; that, by a different course, they might have saved a large portion of their principal’s estate from the wreck and ruin of the war; that if they had not sold his real estate that would have escaped the hazards of sequestration as well as the fires-which did at last consume a large portion of the city;.
I have extracted this much from the opinion in Myers v. Zetelle for the purpose of showing the exact grounds upon which this court, in that case, relieved the agents from personal liability. In the first place, they had the undoubted authority to collect the Pizzini debt, though not due, by the express terms of the power of attorney. In the second place, they had the best reasons to believe, and did honestly believe, that the security (being a house in a city which was the objective point of all the operations of the Federal armies) was threatened with destruction. How, in the case before us, while, as a matter of course, the executor has the general power to collect the debts due his testator, he certainly has no right to release a debt, or to discharge a debtor of undoubted solvency from his whole obligation by receiving a part of it. He has no authority to receive in a depreciated currency a debt payable in gold and well secured upon real estate ample in value to make it perfectly safe, unless the exigencies of the estate require it; or, where there are no debts (as in this case), those who are entitled to distribution consent to receive it. In Myers v. Zetelle the agents had the express authority to collect Confederate money, for that money was in circulation at the time the power of attorney was executed, and was very soon afterwards the only circulating medium. Again, in the case 'before us the security for the debt was not a house in a city threatened with destruction,
The two cases differ, therefore, in these two essential particulars. In the one case the authority to collect the debt was conceded; in the other, the executor himself admits, in writing, that “it would not be proper for him, as executor, to receive Confederate money, unless the heirs would agree to take it from him.” In the one case the security was, to say the least, doubtful; in the other it was ample and could not be destroyed.
But it is argued that the executor ought to be relieved because a majority of the heirs agreed to receive Confederate money. Surely, the consent of two of the heirs cannot affect the rights of the other one, who never gave her assent, but purposely withheld it. It was manifestly to the interest of James M. Hite, in his own right, and as trustee for Mrs. Baker, to give his assent to the arrangement proposed, to sell the land for Confederate money, and to receive that currency in payment of their legacies, for every dollar that was received from Irvine Hite to that extent relieved the land of James M. Hite from the lien fixed upon it by the will of his father for the payment of the purchase money. The interest of Mrs. Skinker was very different. Her whole patrimony consisted in her share of the debt due from Irvine and James M. Hite; and that debt had been secured to her by her father in reserving a lien upon land of sufficient value to make it secure, and its payment certain beyond a peradventure. There was no reason why she should give up.
But it is insisted that the executor is relieved from all liability, and the whole loss must fall upon the appellees, because Skinker and wife heard of the sale and did hot object to it, though they had opportunity to inform the executor-of their dissent, and, because they failed to do this, they must now be placed in the same situation as if they had given their assent. The record shows that Mrs. Skinker was in a distant county, which, part of the time, was in the lines of the federal armies, and all the time difficult of communication with the town of Winchester. It is not t shown that she knew anything of the matter till after
Much has been said in argument about the hardship of holding the executor bound in this case. Such hardships meet us every day. The “ hard cases ” arising out of transactions in Confederate currency are constantly before us and constantly to be deplored. This is but another fragment of the numberless wrecks and widespread ruin which are found in the track of the terrible storm of civil war which has desolated our country and wrecked the hopes and the fortunes of a whole people.
But if a court is to be turned from its line of duty in the stern administration of justice upon the well settled principles of law governing each case, by considering the peculiar hardship of the case, would not that consideration operate with full force in favor of the appellees, Skinker and wife. Is it not as “ hard a case” that the loss should fall upon them ? Would it not be a great hardship to take away from a married woman who never, through herself or her husband, by word or act assented to any of these arrangements entered into by the executor and the other heirs, that patrimony which her father in his will and by his solemn agreement had so carefully secui’ed to her ? Would it be no hardship to Skinker, who, when these transactions were going on, was fighting the battles of his country, or languishing in a Northern prison, or sick and wounded in a hospital, and had nothing to do with them, except to withhold his consent from an arrangement which others were deeply interested to make but which must certainly impair if not certainly destroy his wife’s patrimony. Would it be no hardship to him, after the war was over, after suffering all its privations and dangers and wounds and imprison
Moncure, P., and Anderson, J., concurred in the opinion of Christian, J.
Staples and Bouldin, Js., dissented.
The court having affirmed the decree, the appellant asked for a rehearing of the case.
I have had great difficulty in bringing my mind to the conclusion, in this case, that the appellees are entitled to hold the executor responsible for that portion of Mrs. Skinker’s legacy from her father, which has been lost by the executor’s receiving payment thereof in Confederate securities, although
Although a personal representative, acting strictly within the line of his duty, and exercising reasonable care and diligence, will not be responsible for the failure or depreciation of the fund in which any part of the estate may be invested, yet if that line of duty be not strictly pursued, and any part of the property be invested by such personal representative in funds or securities not authorized, or be put within the control of persons who ought not to be entrusted with it, and a loss thereby be eventually sustained, such personal representative will be liable to make it good, however unexpected the result, however little likely to arise from the course adopted, and however free such conduct may have been from any improper motive. 2 Lomax’s ex’ors, top p. 483, side p. 293.
In this case, upon mature deliberation, I am reluctantly forced to the conclusion that the executor did not act strictly within the line of his duty and authority. The will was his directory. It clothed him with all the authority he had in the premises. It was the law to him. It was his duty to follow its directions, and to carry out the intention of the testator. When a dying man confides to a surviving friend the execu
In this case, if the executor had conformed to the provisions of the will and to the contract which the testator had made with his sons, which was evidently made in contemplation of death, and may be regarded as a part of his testamentary disposition, and which at least as executor he was bound to enforce, it is unquestionable that no loss could have been sustained by the legatees, by himself, or anybody else. By the express stipulation of this contract of sale to his sons
It seems to me that the executor was not acting in the line of duty, when, in order to enable J. I. Hite, one of the purchasers, to pay up and discharge his proportion of the purchase money (as agreed between his brother and himself) in a very depreciated currency, he united with him in a deed of conveyance to the purchaser from him of one-half the land for depreciated Confederate money, and releasing thereby one-half the security for the remainder of the purchase money, without the consent of the legatee who is appellee here. In doing so he also departed from the only authority given to him to convey the title under the contract aforesaid, after the death of the testator’s wife, who was then living. Although he acted from the most generous motives toward J. I. Hite and his sister Caroline, who was importuning him for money, and toward James Madison Hite, he was acting not by the request or with the consent of Eliza Skinker, the legatee who brought this suit for her legacy, and in acting as he did he assumed a personal responsibility. He was aware of it
The decree was as follows:
October 8th, 1873.—This day came again the parties by counsel, and the court having maturely considered the transcript of the record of the decree
Whereupon, the appellants by counsel moved the court to set aside the foregoing decree and grant them a rehearing thereof; but because the court here is not yet advised of the judgment to be rendered in the premises, time is taken to consider thereof.
And at another day, to wit: the 17th day of November, 1871.—The appellants having submitted a motion at the last term of this court to set aside the decree pronounced in this cause on the 8th day of October 1873, and grant a rehearing thereof, and the court having maturely considered the motion aforesaid, and the arguments of counsel filed therein, doth order that the motion aforesaid be overruled, and that the decree pronounced in this cause, on the 8th day of October 1873, be certified to the Circuit court of Frederick county.
Decree arrirmed.