Case Name: Desire Leonard, Appellant, versus George Leonard and Others
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1808-10
Citations: 3 Tyng 533
Docket Number: 
Parties: * Desire Leonard, Appellant, versus George Leonard and Others.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 4
Pages: 467–467

Head Matter:
* Desire Leonard, Appellant, versus George Leonard and Others.
In the assignment of dower, commissioners are only to regard the rents and profits.
This was an appeal from a decree of the judge of probate for this county, refusing to accept the return of certain commissioners appointed by him to assign and set off to the appellant her dower in the estate of her late husband, Samuel Leonard, Esquire, the respondents being the heirs at law of the said deceased.
Upon inspection of the return, it appeared that the commissioners had appraised the whole of the deceased’s real estate at 61,440 dollars, a considerable part of which was woodland, and unproductive, and had then assigned to the appellant certain parcels of the estate, amounting, by the appraisement of the commissioners, to the sum of 20,480 dollars, being one third of the whole, excluding therefrom the greater part of the woodland.
It was agreed that the parcels assigned as dower to the appellant comprised the most productive parts of the deceased’s estate, and that the commissioners had regarded the actual value of the several parcels in their assignment, and not the income thereof.
Wheaton and Baylies for the appellant.
Sproat and Tillinghast for the respondents.

Opinion:
By the Court.
In the assignment of dower, commissioners are lo regard the rents and profits only of the several parcels of the estate out of which the dower is to be assigned. When they have ascertained the annual income of the whole estate, they ought to set off to the widow such a part as will yield her one third part of such income, in parcels best calculated for the convenience of herself and of the heirs. This rule is adapted equally to protect widows from having an unproductive part of estates assigned to them, and to guard heirs from being left, during the life of the widow, without the means of support.
The decree of the judge of probate was affirmed, and the cause remitted to him for further proceedings.