Case ID: dc_12/html/0457-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Chief Justice Cartter", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Eleanora Hayden, by her next friend, Joseph E. Hayden, vs. Sophia A. Weser et al.
    In Equity.
    No. 6823.
    { Decided April 6, 1882.
    
      i Tlie CmEF Jostio k and Justice^Cox and Jambs sitting.
    1. A widow’s dower before assignment cannot be sold by decree of a court of equity to satisfy an indebtedness diie from the widow to the heir, growing out of her management of the heir’s estate while acting as guardian thereof.
    2. The costs of all permanent improvements made before assignment of dower are to be charged to the heir and not to the doweress.
    Statement oe the Case.
    George Ailer died, in the year 1865, intestate, possessed of certain real estate in the city of Washington, and leaving his widow, now Mrs. Weser, and Eleauora Ailer, now Hayden, his only child and heir-at-law, surviving him. His widow assumed the administration of his estate and the guardianship of the child. The rents of the latter’s estate amounted to about S3,500 per annum. '
    In June, 1879, the daughter having married, this suit was brought for an account of Mrs. Weser’s guardianship she having been, on the petition of hef daughter, by her husband as next friend, removed from that trust March 1, 1879. The cause was thereupon referred to the auditor of the court, with directions to state an account. The report found a balance of |13,779.44 against the defendant, and the court below entered a decree for the sale of the defendant’s dower interest in her late husband’s real estate for the payment and satisfaction of this balance less the credit obtained by the allowance of several exceptions as to certain items of the account.
    From this decree defendant appealed.
    M. F. Morris for plaintiff.
    Hiñe & Thomas for defendant.
    1. Dower, before assignment to the widow, is not the subject of- sale for the satisfaction of creditors. Jackson vs. 
      Aspell, 20 John., 411. And this doctrine is maintained in Massachusetts, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, Alabama, and several other States of the Union. Gooch vs. Atkins, 14 Mass.. 878 ; Johnson vs. Morse, 2 N. H,, 48 ; Shields vs. Bates, 5 J. J. Marsh, 12 ; Petty vs. Nailer, 15 B. Mon., 591 ; Nason vs. Allen, 5 Greenl., 479 ; Waller vs. Mardus, 29 Mo., 25 ; Wallis vs. Smith, 2 S. & M., 220; Torrey vs. Minor, 1 Suit. & M. Ch., 489; Hooks vs. Graham, 23 Ill., 81; Wallace vs. Hall, 19 Ala., 367 ; Blair vs. Harrison, 11 Ill., 384; Summers vs. Babb, 13 Ill., 483 ; Tompkins vs. Fonda, 4 Paige, 448.
    This, we believe, is the first instance in the judicial history of this District where dower lights, before assignment, have been sold for the satisfaction of creditors ; the text-writers and the reports everywhere seem to be silent on the subject. There would seem to beAprecedent for the action of the court below.
    Now, if a widow’s dower before assignment cannot be taken and sold on execution at law, we fail to see any reason why, before assignment, an equity court can take hold of it any more than a court of law ; it certainly is not because the estate or interest is any more tangible in that form than in the other. It certainly will not be seriously maintained here that chancery trustees have more efficient means of effecting a sale of such an interest than the marshal has. In this case the widow was dowable in five separate pieces of property. The proper course for the plaintiff to have taken was, first, to have asked the court to appoint a receiver of the dower interest in this property ; then that the dower be assigned ; and, last of all, that it be sold.
    2. Permanent improvements are to be charged to the heir and not to the widow.
    The evidence disclosed the fact that the guardian had expended about $4,000 in permanent improvements upon her ward’s estate. The auditor charged one-third the cost of permanent improvements to the widow. This was error: the whole cost of these improvements should have been charged to the ward. 1 Boper H. & W., 349 ; Park on Dow., 257 ; Kent, vol. 4, 65 ; 1 Wash. R. P., 236 ; Humphrey vs. Phinney, 2 John., 484 ; Hale vs. James, 6 John. Ch., 260 ; Catlin vs. Ware, 9 Mass., 218 ; Larrowe vs. Beam, 10 Ohio, 498 ; Thompson vs. Morrow, 5 Serg. & R., 289 ; Powell vs. Manf. & C. Co., 3 Mason, 349 : McClanahan vs. Porter, 10 Mo., 746.
   Mr. Chief Justice Cartter

delivered the opinion of the court.

The chief questions involved in this appeal are whether, ■ in this District, a widow’s dower before assignment can be sold for the satisfaction of creditors, and whether the costs of all permanent improvements before assignment of dower should not be charged to the heir.' We are of opinion that both thesé questions should be resolved in favor of the appellant; the decree appealed from is therefore reversed, and the cause remanded to ’ the court below with directions to recommit the cause to the auditor with instructions to charge the cost of all permanent improvements to the heir, and to re-examine his account on the other points excepted to and which were overruled in the court below.