Opinion ID: 1113494
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Heading: Interpretation of Forced Heirship as a Constitutionally Protected Legal Institution and Individual Right of Inheritance

Text: In cases arising under Article IV, § 16 of the Louisiana Constitution of 1921, our courts recognized that this specific limitation on the plenary power of the legislature prohibited the abolishment of forced heirship as a legal institution and guaranteed every individual a constitutionally enforceable right to a forced portion of his or her decedent's estate. Succession of Hyde, 292 So.2d 693 (La.1974); Succession of Gambino, 225 La. 674, 73 So.2d 800 (1954); Succession of Thomson, 221 La. 791, 60 So.2d 411 (1952); Succession of Earhart, 220 La. 817, 57 So.2d 695 (1952); Succession of Guerre, 197 So.2d 738 (La.App. 4th Cir.), writ denied, 250 La. 928, 929, 933, 199 So.2d 925, 926 (1967); State ex rel. Muslow v. Louisiana Oil Refining Corp., 176 So. 686 (La.App. 2d Cir.1937); Akin v. Louisiana Nat'l Bank, 322 F.2d 749 (5th Cir.1963). See also cases recognizing that Article IV, § 16 constitutionally excluded or limited the legislature's power to create substitutions, fidei commissa, and trust estates. Pires v. Youree, 170 La. 986, 129 So. 552 (1930); Daugherty v. Canal Bank & Trust Co., 154 So. 681 (La.App. 1st Cir.), rev'd in part on other grounds, 180 La. 1003, 158 So. 366 (1934); Hart v. Mechanics & Traders Ins. Co., 46 F.Supp. 166 (W.D.La. 1942). In Succession of Guerre, 197 So.2d at 743-44, for example, the court of appeal held that a parent's attempt to circumvent his child's constitutional right as a forced heir by converting his estate into United States savings bonds would not defeat the child's action for reduction of excessive donations, and stated: There is no right more sacred in our laws than the right of a forced heir to inherit no less than a fixed minimum, which we call the legitime. This right is so deeply ingrained in our civil law that it has been declared in the Constitution of Louisiana in Article IV, Section 16, thus protecting it from the risk of legislative infringement. We must agree that a child has no vested right in his parent's property during the lifetime of the parent, but he has a constitutionally vested right of inheritance to not less than a fixed portion of his parent's property. By the same token, this court in Succession of Thomson, 221 La. 791, 60 So.2d 411 (1952) enforced an adopted child's forced heirship claim and held that an adoptive parent and child cannot by contract abrogate the relationship existing between them. The court concluded: Under the constitution of this state, no law can be passed abolishing forced heirship and children lawfully adopted have the same rights in the successions of persons adopting them as children who are forced heirs. Section 15 [sic], Article 4 of the Constitution of 1921. Id. at 800, 60 So.2d at 414. Bequests in wills constituting prohibited substitutions were held to be invalid because they violated constitutional and statutory provisions. Succession of Guillory 232 La. 213, 94 So.2d 38 (1957) (The bequest is clearly a prohibited substitution, and, as such, violative of the public policy of this state as expressed in our basic and statutory law, Section 16 of the Fourth Article of the Constitution of 1921.... Id. at 217, 94 So.2d at 39); Succession of Meadors, 135 So.2d 679 (La.App. 2d Cir.1961). On the other hand, Article IV, § 16 contained an exception that proved the rule by allowing the legislature to authorize the creation of trusts for educational, charitable, or religious purposes, and the creation for private purposes of trusts with limited terms. Accordingly, laws authorizing trusts meeting these criteria were held to be enforceable and not in violation of Article IV, § 16. Succession of Earhart, 220 La. 817, 57 So.2d 695 (1952) (will established a private trust estate for ten years); Succession of Maguire, 228 La. 1096, 85 So.2d 4 (1955) (educational and charitable trust); Voisin v. Luke, 341 So.2d 6 (La.App. 1st Cir.1976), writ denied, 342 So.2d 224 (1977) (private trust); Pires v. Youree, 170 La. 986, 129 So. 552 (1930) (charitable trust). Jurists and scholars alike recognized the strong, almost sacred, constitutional policy favoring forced heirship not only because it was a socially desirable instrument to avoid excessive concentration of wealth but also due to its being the most efficient means of protecting children from unjust disinheritance and of promoting equitable distribution and equality in the family. Akin v. Louisiana Nat'l Bank of Baton Rouge, 322 F.2d 749, 756, (5th Cir.1963) (Wisdom, J.) (citing Dainow, Forced Heirship in French Law, 2 La.L.Rev. 669 (1940); Dainow, supra, 4 La. L.Rev. 42; Daggett, supra, 11 Tul.L.Rev. at 399-401 (Forced heirship ... remains as a bulwark of equality for the family and is a known and accepted method for wealth distribution.). The legislature itself recognized and respected the rights of individuals to forced heirship and the limitation upon its power to legislate with respect to the legal institution. Between 1921 and 1962 the legislature proposed several amendments to Article IV, § 16 of the 1921 Louisiana Constitution. The legislature on two occasions sought and obtained the voters' approval of amendments to relax the limitation on its power to authorize trust estates. See 1962 La. Acts, No. 521, adopted November 6, 1962, granting the legislature the power to authorize the creation of substitutions in trust and to place a forced heir's legitime in trust. See 1952 La. Acts, No. 208, § 1, adopted November 4, 1952, expanding the terms and purposes for which the legislature could authorize trusts. In two other instances the legislature successfully proposed amendments to Article IV, § 16 expanding adopted persons' rights to forced heirship. See 1958 La. Acts, No. 548, adopted November 4, 1958; 1944 La. Acts, No. 318, adopted November 7, 1944. In proposing each of these amendments the legislature properly and correctly recognized the constitutional rights and limits created by Article IV, § 16 of the 1921 Constitution. It was the judgment of knowledgeable commentators, however, that Article IV, § 16 did not go so far as to petrify in detail each and every statutory forced heirship rule or procedure in effect in 1921. Rather, there was solidarity in belief that Article IV, § 16 allowed the legislature reasonable latitude to pass laws regulating and implementing the legal institution of forced heirship. Tucker, Substitutions, Fideicommissa and Trusts in Louisiana Law: A Semantical Reappraisal, 24 La.L.Rev. 439, 473 (1964); Le Van, supra, 52 Tul.L.Rev. at 48; Lemann, supra, 52 Tul. L.Rev. at 27; Comment, Forced Heirs, The Legitime and Loss of the Legitime in Louisiana, 37 Tul.L.Rev. 710, 722 (1963); O'Quin, Bench and BarOur Trust Estates and Their Limitations, 22 Tul.L.Rev. 585, 586 (1948); See Succession of Earhart, 220 La. 817, 57 So.2d 695 (1952) (Dictum: This provision does not prohibit the legislature from regulating or restricting the rights of forced heirs. Id. at 825, 57 So.2d at 697). Undoubtedly, the jurists assumed that the constitutional provision incorporated the tradition of the legislature regulating forced heirship by adjusting the disposable portion and the causes of disinherison as it had prior to the adoption of the 1921 Louisiana Constitution and its Article IV, § 16. See 1972 Compiled Edition of the Civil Codes of Louisiana (Dainow ed. 1973) La.Civ.Code of 1808, arts. 19 and 130, at 212, 236; La.Civ.Code of 1825, arts. 1480 and 1613; La.Civ.Code of 1870, arts. 1493 and 1621.