Case Name: Benjamin M. Piatt v. Heirs of St. Clair and Bank of the United States and others
Court: Supreme Court of Ohio
Jurisdiction: Ohio
Decision Date: 1832-12
Citations: 5 Ohio 555
Docket Number: 
Parties: *Benjamin M. Piatt v. Heirs of St. Clair and Bank of the United States and others.
Judges: 
Reporter: Cases decided in the supreme court of ohio : upon the circuit at the special sessions in Columbus
Volume: 5
Pages: 507–508

Head Matter:
*Benjamin M. Piatt v. Heirs of St. Clair and Bank of the United States and others.
Though administrator may have disposed of all the estate of an intestate, yet if he decease, no legal proceeding can he had to charge the estate without, appointing administrator de bonis non.
This was a suit in chancery adjourned from the county of Hamilton. The object of the bill was to charge the real estate of the late Arthur St. Clair, deceased, in the hands of the defendants, with the payment of a debt of the intestate. Administration had been granted, and all the estate, real and personal, disposed of, by the administrator, who died after.the commencement of this suit. No administrator de bonis non having been appointed, a question was made whether the cause could proceed without such appointment, and the person receiving it being party defendant to the suit.
Caswell and Starr, and Hammond, for the complainant,
in-sisted that an administrator de bonis non need not be appointed. The whole estate having been disposed of, and the defendants being alone interested in resisting the debt, and in protecting the property against being subjected to the payment of it, there was nothing fo’r an administrator de bonis non to do.
N. Wright and Worthington, for the respondents,
suggested . that if the court were of opinion th^t a valid decree could be «•made, as the case stood, they were satisfied.

Opinion:
By the Court :
It is safest to make the appointment. It has always been held -that to charge a decedent's estate with his debts, there must be a personal representative to proceed against. We are not willing to make a new precedent. The cause will be continued that the ap,;pointment may be made, and the party brought before the court.