Opinion ID: 1927641
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Practical construction

Text: The trial court's instructions are based in part upon a determination that the trustees have in fact been distributing proceeds of land sales to certificate holders for 70 years. The parties have devoted a large share of their arguments before this court to disputing the evidentiary support of that determination by the trial court. Analyzing trust accounts through differing accounting theories, Burlington Northern argues that land sale proceeds have never been distributed to certificate holders, while the Arms assert that land proceeds have regularly been distributed out of the trust's commingled bank account. [14] We find it unnecessary to decide whether or not land sale proceeds have in practice been distributed to certificate holders. If the trustees have never distributed land sale proceeds, that would not restrict their power to do so under trust paragraph 4. If the trustees have distributed land sale proceeds, that would prove no more than that the trustees have exercised the authority which is clearly granted to them in paragraph 4. Surely, prior distributions of relatively minor proceeds from land sales could not give rise to a duty to sell off all trust lands and distribute all proceeds to certificate holders in the future. Contrary to the Arms' suggestion, we find that no theory of estoppel could possibly apply to prevent Burlington Northern from contesting future liquidation of all reversion-bound lands simply because it may have acquiesced in some relatively small prior distributions. The trial court's reliance upon inadmissible extrinsic evidence, inconclusive practical construction, and an unwarranted reading of the trust instrument imposing a duty to liquidate all trust assets, in effect destroying the reversion, is erroneous. In our earlier opinion in this case, we recognized Burlington Northern's interest in the trust as reversioner, and we reversed the trial court's attempt to destroy the reversion by terminating the trust. Now the trial court has instructed the trustees that they have a duty to do, in effect, that which this court prevented the trial court from doing directly. The instruction to convert all trust assets to cash must be disapproved. It is not only erroneous and unsupported by the trust instrument or other evidence but also is inconsistent with this court's prior opinion.