Court Opinion

ID: 9590247
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:52:58.881264+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:05.644936
License: Public Domain

WHITE, P. J.
I concur.
The facts in the instant case present a situation for application of an age old principle that law and good morals should be one and inseparable. The will of the decedent herein gave his widow only the income from the property of the estate during her lifetime, and on her death, the corpus was bequeathed to the husband’s three nieces and a sister. Concededly, the time within which the widow might make an election had not expired when she died. Her death terminated *45all of her rights and interest under the will. Under the facts of this case the problem of an “election” was resolved by her death.
As pointed out by respondent, “There was no longer any choice which could be made. The only thing which remained was her one-half interest in the community property which vested in her on the death of her husband under the provisions of section 201 of the Probate Code. This vested interest in turn became vested in her estate on her death. The widow, or her estate, can now get nothing under the will and the appellant is trying to deprive her, or her estate, of her one-half interest in the community property given to her by statute. The effect of appellant’s contention in this case is that when the widow has not made an election, although the time for election has not expired, that she receives nothing from an estate which she helped to accumulate and conserve for over a period of fifty years.”
To permit such an injustice seems to me shocking and unconscionable, and should not have the imprimatur of the law.
Doran, J., dissented.