Court Opinion

ID: 9862880
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 02:22:53.968449+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:36:59.707275
License: Public Domain

Case, J.
(dissenting). Plaintiff, executor of the will of Emma A. Sands, deceased, seeks a construction of the will of Thomas S. Sands, deceased, that will require reimburse-, ment for medical expenses disbursed by plaintiff’s testatrix in her lifetime and for burial costs paid by plaintiff after her death. The denial of reimbursement for medical expenses should be affirmed not because, as held below, the testatrix had brought and withdrawn a suit upon them in her lifetime but because it is not shown that the medical attention was reasonably necessary. Burial was, of course, necessary. The amount of the bill is not in controversy. The dispute is over the legal obligation of the defendants to pay. The question for decision is whether a testator, in charging the legatees and devisees of his entire estate, real and personal, with the burden of providing a home and maintenance for his wife during her natural life is to be understood, there being no evidence of purpose to the contrar}1, to have thereby directed that the cost of decent burial be included.
The case went in on a narrow stipulation of facts. All that we know with relation to the funéral item is this: Thomas S. Sands and Emma A. Sands were husband and wife. Sands died July 15, 1938, leaving a will which was probated and which directed that his debts and funeral expenses be paid *193and that all the remainder of his estate, real and personal, should go to his son, William M. Sands, and his daughter, Elizabeth S. Hughes, in equal shares upon condition that they “provide a home and maintenance” for his wife for and during her natural life if she should so long remain his widow; such provisions to be accepted in lieu of dower. Mrs. Sands accepted the provisions in lieu of dower and did not remarry. She died January 6, 1949, leaving a last will and testament, the executor of which paid funeral expenses of $650. The making of that disbursement justifies the inference that Mrs. Sands at the time of her death was possessed of so much of an estate. Mrs. Sands’ will was executed the day following that of her husband. Both wills were witnessed by the late Judge Erwin E. Marshall, and from those dates and that circumstance it may further be fairly inferred that the wills were the result of a joint impulse, that they were not only made with knowledge by each of the testators of what the other was doing but that they were both drawn and executed under the supervision of Mr. Marshall, known as an able and a careful practitioner. Significance, therefore, attaches to the fact that Mr. Sands’ will contained the usual provision that the testator’s debts and funeral expenses be paid upon his death, while Mrs. Sands’ will contains no reference whatever to debts or funeral expenses.
The controlling factor is the testator’s intent. Did or did not Mr. Sands, in directing that home and maintenance be provided for his wife during her natural life, mean to include a decent 'burial ? The question may helpfully be generalized by asking whether, normally, a husband, under the relations ordinarily existing between husband and wife, would direct that his wife, throughout her life, was to be given home and maintenance without intending thereby to include the interment of her body at death. Por a husband to charge his estate with the support of his wife during the remainder of her life and to leave his entire estate, charged with that burden, to his children is a natural course; to make such a provision with the intention that the wife is to be taken' care of until death, but that her burial is no concern of the hus*194band and is not to be a charge upon his estate is, I suggest, not a natural course. Does it comport with common expectation that a husband should burden his entire estate—not merely the income therefrom—with the obligation to provide his wife throughout her life with a comfortable living, without, in so doing, intending to provide for that final act so inevitable to life, the laying away of her mortal remains? One shrinks from the thought that the mere absence of specific reference to burial from a provision for a wife’s support throughout her life should be interpreted as an intention that at the solemn moment when breath shall cease the husband’s provision shall also cease and the body be left unattended where it may chance to be. Burial is the dropping of the curtain at the end of life’s drama. Action is over, but the lowering of the curtain is, by ancient and common acceptance, an incident of the play.
It is truly said that we may not add to the will that which is not there; but my view is that the direction is there. Lacking proof of facts which indicate a purpose to the contrary, a direction by a husband in his will that his wife be given suitable support throughout her life should be interpreted as manifesting an intent that at death, the culmination of life, she shall be buried. It is conceivable that for reasons peculiar to a particular case a husband may wish to withhold the cost of his wife’s interment, but such an instance would be an exception from the ordinary course and the burden of proof should be upon him who asserts the fact so to be.
It is argued that here the wife had a separate estate which the husband could have anticipated would be sufficient to meet the costs of her burial. That reasoning and the inferential purpose could have existed, 'but we have no proof that they did exist. Such small sidelights as we have, as, for example, the absence from Mrs. Sands’ will, drawn and executed under the circumstances mentioned above, of the usual direction that the executor shall pay funeral expenses from the decedent’s estate, indicate that they did not. Let us assume a frequently occurring event—the husband directs in his will that his estate shall provide support for his wife *195throughout her life, and the wife has a small estate of her own. There is no assurance that the latter estate will outlast the wife; if it does not, or if it proves insufficient, shall she be given a pauper’s burial, there being ample funds in her husband’s estate to meet that expense? The pertinence of this line of thought is its bearing upon what a husband is ordinarily to be understood as having in mind when he makes such a provision. There is nothing to suggest the alternative that the expense will be upon the husband’s estate if the wife lias not sufficient funds or will be excluded if she has. The provision, either does or does not cover the item.
In Wilson v. Staats, 33 N. J. Eq. 524 (Prerog. 1881), Henry M. Wilson died leaving a will which gave all the residue of the estate to 'be divided equally between the testator’s sister Jane and his brother Dowe, “the money to be put on bond and mortgage and the interest to be paid them yearly, for their support,” with the further provision that “if the interest should prove insufficient for the purpose, then so much of the principal as might be necessary for the purpose, should be applied thereto.” There was a gift over of the principal, or what remained of it, at the death of Jane and Dowe. The named beneficiaries were indigent and on Jane’s death Wilson’s executor paid her burial expense. On the accounting the item was disputed. The court held that the funeral expenses were necessaries and allowed the item. The direct bearing of the decision, which has never been overruled, is that it fairly involved a finding that under the circumstances of the case the funeral expense came within the reach of the testamentary provision for support.
The courts of Pennsylvania have apparently taken a position the other way, In re Richey’s Estate, 96 A. 748 (Sup. Ct. of Pennsylvania, 1916), although the finding is not accompanied by reasoning, and the case of Lawall v. Kreidler, 3 Rawle (Sup. Ct. of Pennsylvania, 1832), cited as having some pertinence, goes upon a question with which we are not concerned, viz., the obligation of an estate of a deceased husband, per se, to answer for the funeral expense of a wife who survived him.
*19650 Am. Jur., Support of Persons, § 12, p. 877, carries the statement that provisions for life support have generally been interpreted as not to include the payment of funeral expenses, resting that statement upon a footnote citing “Anno: 101 A. L. R. 1501.” Such of the cases named in the cited reference as relate to 'burial expenses are In re Van De Walker (1913), 79 Misc. 661, 141 N. Y. S. 325; Richey's Estate, supra; In re Brandes, 145 Iowa 743, 122 N. W. 954 (Sup. Ct. Iowa, 1909); Morris v. Fain, 165 Ga. 879, 142 S. E. 119 (Sup. Ct. of Ga. 1928), and Skeen v. Parsons, 94 W. Va. 584, 119 S. E. 681. In re Van De Walker was a case wherein a husband gave, by will, the use of all of his property to his indigent widow for life with a right to as much of the principal as should be necessary for her maintenance. It was held that the intention was to have her burial expenses paid oirt of the estate. That is in line with my view. In re Brandes, Morris v. Fain and Skeen v. Parsons are distinguishable in that they passed, not upon a provision made in a husband’s will for his wife’s suport, but upon the effect of agreements made at arm’s length on consideration wherein persons apparently not related to those for whom the benefit ran undertook to render care or provide support for life and were held not to be chargeable under their respective contracts with burial expenses. On the other hand, McKnight v. McKnight, 180 N. W. 437 (Sup. Ct. of Mich. 1920), in construing an agreement entered into on consideration to support, care for and provide a woman with a home during her natural life, held that the obligation fairly implied board, lodging, clothing, care and incidental necessities commensurate with her customary condition and walk in life, and also proper care, nursing and medical attendance in sickness and suitable burial at death. It is of interest to note that an obligation imposed by statute to support has been held to include funeral expense. Phillips v. Home Undertakers, 192 Okla. 597, 138 P. 2d 550.
Matter of Frayer, 155 Misc. 811 (1935); affirmed, 246 App. Div. 703, was in the Surrogate’s Court of New York County, N. Y. The testator had given $15,000 to a trustee *197iu trust to collect and receive the income and apply such income to the use of one Elizabeth Harned during her natural life, with power in the trustee, at discretion, to pay over to the beneficiary or for-her account any part or the whole of the principal of the trust fund. It was held that there was no gift of principal, that the gift was of a simple trust and that the remainder passed under the residuary clause but that, Mrs. Harned having died insolvent, the principal of the fund should be applied to the payment of the burial expense and that such was the testator’s intent. The opinion followed the decision in In re Estate of James Montgomery, Deceased, 129 Misc. 14 (New York Surrogate’s Court, Monroe County, 1927), wherein a trustee was, by will, directed to pay over to the beneficiary, a daughter, all the income and so much of the corpus as the trustee might from time to time deem necessary for the support and maintenance of the beneficiary during her lifetime. It was held in the Montgomery case that the trustee should be allowed credit for the amount of the funeral bill arising from the beneficiary’s death, she having died without property of her own, although the will gave no direction as to funeral expenses. It was said that where a testator goes beyond mere income for support and shows a desire to have even the principal itself consumed in order to maintain his bounty he is deemed to have intended that such beneficiary should not only have every ordinary incident of the comfortable station in life which his liberality was maintaining, but to have further intended not to bring the scene to a disgraceful close “by stopping short at death and abandoning the body of the beneficiary to be buried, perhaps, as a pauper.”
Dooley v. Penland, 156 Tenn. 284, 300 S. W. 9 (Sup. Ct. Tenn. 1927), is a holding that under a husband’s will leaving funds in trust for the support of his widow during her life a funeral bill was properly paid from income in the hands of the trustee at her death.
In Wooten’s Trustee v. Hardy, 221 Ky. 338, 298 S. W. 963 (Ky. 1927), Mr. Wooten, a widower, was survived by an only daughter, then sixteen years of age. His will di*198rooted that his property with certain exceptions be turned over to his daughter’s trustee, the interest to be used for. her support and maintenance, the principal not to be encroached upon unless in the judgment of her trustee “it becomes necessary for her proper support and education,” that upon her ■becoming “twenty-five years of age, if she live so long,” one-fifth of the principal to be paid to her “annually until she is thirty years of age, if she so long live.” The will further provided that if the daughter should die without issue various gifts over should take effect. The daughter died at the age of twenty-one years, unmarried, and without issue. At her death a dispute arose between her executor and the heirs at law of her father over several questions, one of them being the obligation of her father’s estate to pay her funeral bills. The court held: “Under the facts of this case it is * * * evident that the testator intended the burial expenses of his daughter to be embraced in her maintenance. Though the spirit departed, the sacred form remained; it was his daughter’s body and he desired it properly maintained (interred) (sic). The language of the will is broad enough to embrace the expenses thereby incurred, and the trust estate was created as much for this as for her maintenance during life; in this respect being entirely dissimilar from a devise of a life estate with remainder over where the entire estate passes at once upon the death of the first taker.”
Bogert on Trusts and Trustees, Fart 1 of Voltume 4, ■§ 812, page 180, discussing generally the extent of the term “support” when used in a trust provision, says:
“A trustee has been held entitled to include under the terra ‘support’ * * * the payment of debts and funeral expenses after the life eestui’s death.”
And Scoit on Trusts, Volume 1, § 128.4, page 674, in a similar discussion, states:
“Ordinarily it would seem that if there are trust funds available for the purpose of paying funeral expenses, at least if the beneficiary left no property sufficient for the purpose, the trustee has the power and the duty to pay the funeral expenses of the beneficiary for whose support the trust was created.”
*199Those textbook comments and a number of the cited cases were written of trusts generally. I suggest that a husband providing by will for his surviving wife is in special case; that more liberal construction in the wife's favor may be given than where the trust is established, even by will, for persons more distantly related or not related at all; that the provision for a wife by will is certainly deserving of more liberal construction than is a provision in similar language contained in a contract made for consideration between persons not so related;. and that the conditioning of the gift of a husband's entire estate to others upon the providing of home and maintenance for his wife during her life imports a generous solicitude which is foreign to the striking out of burial expenses.
I conclude that the question posed at the beginning of this opinion should be answered in the affirmative, that Mr. Sands intended by the provisions in his will to include the funeral expenses of his wife as a charge upon his estate, and that the judgment below, to the extent of those expenses, should be reversed.
I am authorized by the Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Oliphant to state that they join in this dissenting opinion.
For affirmance—Justices Heher, Wacheneeld, Burling and Ackerson—4.
For reversal—Chief Justice Vanderbilt, and Justices Case and Oliehant—3.