Case Name: Succession of John Henry
Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1893-01
Citations: 45 La. Ann. 156
Docket Number: NO. 11,091
Parties: Succession of Henry.
Judges: 
Reporter: Louisiana Annual Reports
Volume: 45
Pages: 156–160

Head Matter:
NO. 11,091.
Succession of Henry.
“When the record clearly exhibits a “ matter in dispute ” exceeding $2000, a motion .to dismiss on the ground that the “fund to be distributed” has been reduced ibelow that sum will be denied.
A fee of $5000 in a succession whose effects amount to $62,000 is not excessive, when important and valuable services have been rendered by the attorney in litigation and in the general management of the succession, which devolved exclusively upon him in consequence of the continued illness of the executor.
ÍTh« junior mortgage, the “ least ancient,” whether there are one or several immovables mortgaged, is subject to contribute to the payment of privilege debts in case of deficiency in proceeds of sale of movable property.
APPEAL from bhe Civil District Court for the Parish of Orleans. Voorhies, J.
White, Parlange & Saunders for Opponent and Appellant.
J. O. Gilmore, Gilmore & Baldwin, Denegre & Bayne, and P. L. Fourehy, contra:
In determining the fees of attorneys for services rendered in settling a succession, we must consider the amounts involved as shown by the inventories, and also the care and responsibility placed on the shoulders of these attorneys and the professional slrill and attention shown by them in avoiding litigation.
Where fees charged by attorneys in a succession are allowed by a judge below, not withstanding opposition filed thereto, this court will presume that the lower judge can best determine the value of those services and will not reduce the .amounts. Succession Brady, 43 An. 166.
Where the proceeds of property subjected to several successive mortgages are insufficient to pay all the debts and the charges, the loss which may result must be borne by the creditor whose mortgage is the least ancient. R. O. C., Arts. 8269, 8270; cases cited.
An opponent will not be permitted to join inconsequential objections with a demand for reduction of attorney’s fees in this court.

Opinion:
On Motion to Dismiss Appeal.
The opinion of the court was delivered by
Fenner, J.
The motion to dismiss is based on two grounds.
1. That the appeal bond is insufficient in amount.
2. That the amount in dispute, or fund to be distributed, is beneath the lower limit of this court's jurisdiction.
The first point has no merit, and as it is not alluded to in movers' brief we assume that it is abandoned.
The second is equally without merit. The appeal is from a judgment on an opposition to an account which proposed the dis-distribution of a fund exceeding $60,000.
The account exhibited privileged charges aggregating about $9000, one item for which was $5000 to the succession attorneys. The account specifically recited that the Whitney National Bank, as junior mortgage creditor, was bound to contribute from the proceeds attributable to its mortgage the .whole of the privileged debts after first applying to said debts the proceeds of sale of certain furniture, leaving a balance of $5978.76 to be contributed by the bank.
The Whitney Bank filed timely opposition to the account, specially opposing the privileged allowance of $5000 attorney's fees as excessive, and also opposing, on that ground, the amount of the contribution claimed from it, and prayed for an amendment reducing the attorney's fees to $2500, and reducing the amount of its contribution accordingly.
Subsequently the bank consented to the payment of $2500 to the attorneys, both parties reserving their respective rights as to the remaining $2500 to be decided by the court under the pending opposition.
Under this reservation the opposition went to trial and decision, resulting in a judgment dismissing it, maintaining the attorney's fees at the full sum of $5000, and maintaining the contribution required from the Whitney Bank as stated on the account.
Irrespective of subsequent dealings with the "fund to be distributed," the case clearly exhibits a "matter in dispute" exceeding $2000 and falls under that branch of our appellate jurisdiction.
Motion to dismiss denied.