Court Opinion

ID: 9674468
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 04:29:24.525103+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:27.375914
License: Public Domain

Lee, J.
dissenting:
With reference, I think that, under Section 1690, Code of 1942 Recompiled, the testimony of Rye, the defendant, was not admissible, and that the case should be reversed and remanded.
*146Rye’s alleged negligence of course existed before and at the time of the little boy’s injury from which death resulted. Consequently the alleged wrongful act, out of which the claim arose, obviously originated during the lifetime of the deceased.
The applicable part of Section 1690, supra, is set out in the majority opinion, and there is no need to repeat it here. It is enough to say that the statute bars a person from testifying either to establish his claim against the estate of a deceased person or to establish his defense against the estate of a deceased person.
In Griffin v. Lower, 37 Miss. 458 (1859), it was said that the purpose of the statute was “to protect the estate of deceased persons against the operation” of an earlier statute which had made “parties competent witnesses for themselves, or against themselves, if required by the opposite party.” It was conceded by counsel that “the act intended to exclude one party, when the other, being dead, could not confront him. ’ ’
The rule, announced in Griffin v. Lower, supra, was adhered to and reaffirmed in Lamar v. Williams, 39 Miss. 342, where it was said: “The spirit and policy of the proviso appear clearly to be, that a living party, either plaintiff or defendant, in an action in which the representatives of a decedent’s estate are a party, shall not be competent to testify in his oivn behalf to establish his demand or right, asserted and relied on in the action, against the estate, if the matter exceed the sum of fifty dollars; because an undue advantage would thereby be given to the living party, by enabling him to testify to matters which took place between him and the decedent, and which, resting entirely in the private transactions of the parties, could not be disproved or explained by reason of the death of the other party.” (Emphasis supplied.)
In Witherspoon v. Blewett, 47 Miss. 570, the opinion, in commenting on the holding in Griffin v. Lower, 37 Miss. 458, Lamar v. Williams, 39 Miss. 342, and Faler v. *147Jordan, 44 Miss. 289, said: “These cases declare the policy of the statute to be, that ‘ a living party, plaintiff or defendant, in a suit in which the representative of a decedent is a party, is not competent to establish his right or demand’ against the estate. Nor does it matter whether the ‘claim’ be set up by the living plaintiff against the estate, or ivhether it be by way of defense to a ‘claim’ preferred, by the legal representative of a decedent. The manifest reason for the exclusion of such witness is to shut out ex parte evidence touching matters and transactions which transpired in the lifetime of the deceased, after death has sealed the lips of one of the parties, so that his version and, explanations and statements cannot be heard. It was, too, to prevent the establishment of false and simulated claims, by such ex parte and interested testimony, against estates.” The Court also said: “This much is plain; if the suit be for a tort or a contract done or made in the lifetime of the intestate, the survivor is incompetent to prove the one or the other against the estate; so, if he is sought to be charged by the administrator with either, he cannot testify in his discharge.” (Emphasis supplied.)
In Jacks v. Bridewell, 51 Miss. 881, in construing the term “estate of a deceased person” and the statute, the Court made these observations: “Jacks in his bill asserts a ‘right,’ which originated during the lifetime of Braswell, and out of a transaction with Braswell, and if it is ‘against the estate of a deceased person,’ he is incompetent as a witness. The term ‘estate of a deceased person’ is used, in its broad and popular sense, to signify all the property of every hind which one leaves at his death. * * * The exclusion is not confined to cases in which the controversy is between him who would testify to his ‘claim’ or ‘right’, and the administrator or executor of the deceased person, but it extends to every assertion of such right by a party to any part of the estate left by a deceased person, and claimed by such party, or to be *148subject to his demand, by reason of an alleged transaction between such, party and the deceased person. * * * Before statutes on the subject, parties to suits were not competent witnesses in their own behalf. With the removal of the incompetency of parties as witnesses for themselves, there was■ excepted from the cases in which they might testify, all in which a right is asserted against any part of the estate of a deceased person, no matter in whose hands it may be at the time of the controversy, and which ‘right’ rests upon something occurring in the lifetime of such deceased person, and having relation to him. * # * When death has placed the evidence of one of the parties to the transaction, out of which the claim arises, beyond the pale of the court, the statute enacts that the other shall not be heard, for or against such claim. As to that transaction, both of the parties thereto are dead, one through natural causes, the other by legislative enactment.” (Emphasis supplied.)
In Rothschild v. Hatch, 54 Miss. 554, Judge Campbell, who had written the opinion in Jacks v. Bridewell, supra, in following that case, said: “This case was decided-after much deliberation. Our views are expressed in the opinion in very carefully chosen language, cautiously applied to the facts of the case. We have since considered the views therein set forth, and adhere to them.”
In Whitehead v. Kirk, 104 Miss. 776, 61 So. 737, the Court reviewing and following the above-cited cases said that ‘ ‘ The policy of the statute is to close the mouth of the living, because death has sealed the lips of the dead, ’ ’ and ‘ ‘ The claim or right to enforce the payment of a debt against the estate of a deceased person does not originate until the person is dead, but the claim or right upon which the remedy is sought may have originated before or after the death. If it originated before the death, the person making the claim is not permitted to establish same by his own testimony * * *”. (Emphasis supplied.) Whitehead v. Kirk, 104 Miss. 823, 62 So. 432. Suggestion *149of Error. See also Brown v. Parker,143 Miss. 291, 108 So. 492.
Conversely, the person defending the same would not be permitted to defend by his own testimony.
This Court has expressly held, in actions ex delicto, that the survivor in an automobile wreck, who sues the estate of the person whose.alleged negligence proximately caused the plaintiff’s injury, can not testify to establish his claim against the estate of the decedent. Cross, Admr. v. Frost, (Miss.) 86 So. 2d 296; Reynolds v. Snowden, (Miss.) 92 So. 2d 232.
Since the ban upon testimony against the estate of a deceased person, under Section 1690, Code of 1942 Recompiled, extends alike to the claimant, who would establish his claim, and to the opposite party, who would defend against such a claim, the opinion in Cross, Admr. v. Frost, supra, placed great reliance upon Lamar v. Williams, supra, because, in that case, Lamar and Kersh, representing to Williams that one of his slaves had been harboring a runaway slave of Lamar’s, obtained Williams ’ consent to carry his slave to the home of a neighbor there to be confronted by the accusing slave. In their effort to extort information about the runaway slave, these men whipped Williams’ slave severely. For this wrong, Williams sued them; but he died before the case could be tried. The action was revived in the name of the administrator of Williams ’ estate. During the trial, after the plaintiff had rested, Lamar and Kersh offered to testify that they had permission from Williams to whip his slave and that the punishment was not excessive. The trial court refused to admit this testimony and held that the witnesses were incompetent under Article 190, p. 510, Code of 1857. That action of the court was upheld and the cause was affirmed.
A number of later decisions from other jurisdictions have fully vindicated the decision of this Court in Lamar v. Williams, supra. See particularly L. R. A. 1916 D, *150pp. 811-2, where Irvin v. Nolde, 164 Pa. 205, 30 Atl. 246 (1894), and Hallowach v. Priest, 113 Me. 510, 95 Atl. 146 (1915), are annotated; and 36 A. L. R. 960, where Abelein v. Porter, 61 N. Y. Supp. 144, (1899), Minns v. Crossman, 193 N. Y. Supp. 714 (1922), and Forbes v. Snyder, 94 Ill. 374 (1880), are annotated; and 8 A. L. R. 2d 1113, where Waggoner v. Gummerum, 231 N. W. 10 (1930), a Minnesota case, is annotated.
In Irvin v. Nolde, supra, it was held that the disqualifying statute is not confined to cases of contracts, but applies to an action of trespass.
In Hallowach v. Priest, supra, the administrator, for the estate, sued to recover damages for the death, alleged to have occurred by reason of the negligence of the defendant in the operation of an automobile. It was held that the disqualifying statute operated to exclude the testimony of the defendant in regard to the circumstances of the accident. The Court said: “The statute makes no distinction between actions of contract and actions of tort. Nor do we think there is any distinction in reason. The statutory policy that living parties should not be permitted to tell their stories when the lips of adverse parties are sealed by death applies with equal force to torts and contracts. In torts, as in contracts, all the parties ordinarily are cognizant of the circumstances attending the tort. And if by reason of death some of them cannot testify, the others should not. That is the policy of the statute. And this policy has been enforced many times by the court.”
In Waggoner v. Gummerum, supra, the defendant’s offer, in a death action by the administrator, to testify that the decedent made no complaint about the manner in which the automobile was being driven, was held to have been properly excluded.
But the majority opinion holds that, under the wrongful death statute, Section 1453, Code of 1942 Recompiled, the father and mother became the sole beneficiaries of *151the claim for the death of their son; that, although the suit was brought in the name of an administrator, any recovery would inure solely to their benefit; that, since they are the interested parties and are alive, the present controversy is between them and Rye; and that Rye’s testimony was in fact not in defense of a claim against him by the estate of a deceased person, but was in defense of a claim by living parties. For this conclusion, reliance is placed upon Fennell, Admr. v. McGowan, 58 Miss. 261, and Miss. Power Company v. Archibald, 189 Miss. 332, 196 So. 760.
In Fennell, Admr. v. McGowan, supra, McGowan sold the Falconer note of $500 with the collateral note of $1,500, not to John D. Fennell, but to John D. Fennell, agent of M. T. Fennell. The collateral note, as a result of no effort to collect, became barred by the statute of limitations. Of course John D. Fennell did not own the securities nor did his estate succeed to ownership thereof following his death. Nevertheless, when he died, the administrator of his estate, for the use of M. T. Fennell, sued McGowan to recover. McGowan was permitted to testify, and this Court, in affirming the decision of the trial court said: “The fact that the result of this suit may cause the institution of a suit by M. T. Fennell against the estate of John D. Fennell, for the failure of the latter to deal properly with the collateral held by him as agent of the former, does not disqualify McGowan to testify in this case. In such a suit McGowan will have no interest, and in this suit John D. Fennell’s estate has no interest. To work a disqualification of an interested witness, the estate of the decedent must be directly affected by the pending suit. That it may be ultimately affected in some other suit is immaterial.”
On the contrary, the administrator of the estate in this case had the absolute right to bring this suit.
The so-called dead man’s statute was not involved in the case of Mississippi Power Company v. Archibald *152supra. The question there was the deprivation of a substantive right afforded by Federal law. Swearingen’s widow and three children were entitled to receive whatever sum that might be recovered for his death. These survivors were citizens of Kemper County. The power company was a Maine corporation. In a controversy between these parties as plaintiffs and defendant, if the demand exceeded $3,000, the power company was entitled, under Federal law, to remove the cause from the State to the Federal court. Obviously to prevent a removal, Archibald, a citizen of Maine, was appointed administrator of the estate of Swearingen, and he brought the suit, under the wrongful death statute, Section 1453, Code of 1942, against the power company in the Circuit Court of Kemper County for the benefit of the widow and children. The company’s petition for removal was denied. The opinion, in reversing the above action of the trial court, held that the interested parties may sue in the name of an administrator, but that “they cannot, by electing to do so, deprive the Federal Court of the jurisdiction vested in it by virtue of the diversity of citizenship here existing between the real and only parties in interest.” As above-stated, that case dealt with the question of substantive rights. In the present controversy, a procedural question only is involved, namely, the admissibility of evidence. Undoubtedly the sovereign may determine the competency and admissibility of evidence by which a litigant seeks the attainment of a substantive right.
Section 1453, Code of 1942 Recompiled, authorizes the suit to be brought either by an administrator of the deceased person, for the benefit of all persons entitled under the law to recover, or by such persons themselves. The one who first brings the suit has the right to prosecute and maintain it to a conclusion. J. J. Newman Lumber Company v. Scipp, 128 Miss. 322, 91 So. 11; Miss. Power & Light Company v. Smith, 169 Miss. 447, 153 So. *153376; Southern Pine Electric Power Association v. Denson, 214 Miss. 397, 57 So. 2d 859.
In J. J. Newman Lumber Company v. Scipp, supra, an administratrix of the estate of Charlie Scipp had been appointed and had already instituted suit and obtained service of process on the defendant. Any recovery from that litigation would' have inured solely to the benefit of Fannie Scipp, the widow and sole heir. But she brought a suit in her own name and obtained a verdict and judgment. On appeal this Court, solely because of a pending suit by the administratrix of the estate, reversed the judgment in her favor, and entered judgment for the appellant.
New York and Illinois cases have rejected this contention.
In Abelein v. Porter, supra, it was argued that the administrator, who brought the suit for recovery under the wrongful death statute, which was for the exclusive benefit of the next of kin, was not an administrator in the ordinary acceptation, but simply a trustee for certain specified purposes. But the court answered that this “novel proposition” was founded upon a misapprehension of the real purpose for which the inhibiting statute was enacted, that its design was manifestly for the purpose of depriving a surviving party to the transaction of the unfair advantage which he would gain by giving his version of the controversy when the other party was prevented by death from being heard to contradict or explain the same, and that no sufficient reason suggested itself why the statute should not be applied to every action brought by an administrator, without reference to the disposition to be made of the recovery. Minnis v. Crossman, supra, is to the same effect.
In Forbes v. Snyder, supra, it was contended that the so-called dead man’s statute applied only to those cases by administrators wherein the estate of the deceased person would be increased or diminished, and that dam*154ages in the case in no event wonld constitute a part of the estate of the deceased, hut would go to the next of kin. The Court replied that, while it was true that the damages were not strictly any part of the estate, they constituted a fund cast upon his next of kin by means of his death, and that the case surely came within the letter of the statute and within its spirit; that the tongue of the deceased was silent as to the events which led to his death, and that the same reasons which justified the limitation of the general statute so as to silence adverse parties where the effect of the proceeding was to increase or decrease the estate seemed equally cogent in a case like the one then before the Court. Consequently the defendant was held incompetent to testify.
Under the majority view, holding the testimony of the defendant admissible in this case, the jurisprudence of this State will now sanction this incongrous result: Two motorists, married, with two children each, in separate automobiles, have a headon collision in which one of them is killed and the other seriously but not fatally injured. The survivor sues the estate of the decedent to recover damages on account of the alleged negligence of the decedent. Under Cross, Admr. v. Frost, and Reynolds v. Snowden, supra, he cannot testify. On the contrary, if the estate of the decedent sues the survivor to recover for the alleged wrongful death, such survivor may testify because the administrator, in that suit, would be acting simply for the widow and children, who are living persons. Thus the survivor, in the first instance, cannot testify because both of the parties to the transaction ‘ ‘ are dead, one through natural causes, the other by legislative enactment.” Jacks v. Bridewell, supra. But, in the second instance, that salutary rule has no application. Its efficacy cannot be invoked.
Hall and Arrington, JJ., join in this dissent.