Court Opinion

ID: 9854922
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:16:58.602086+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:23:36.398200
License: Public Domain

Littlejohn, Justice
(dissenting) :
Being of the opinion that the order of the lower court properly carries out the intent of the testator, I respectfully dissent and would affirm.
I am in accord with the circuit judge and would adopt the reasoning of his order, from which I quote extensively as follows:
“It is clear from the above-quoted paragraph [Item 5 quoted in majority opinion] of Mr. Stone’s Will that Mrs. Stone had the right to the use of income during her lifetime; but it is equally clear, from the unambiguous language of *298the very same sentence in the Will by which the right was given her, that she was limited to such use of income ‘for her comfortable support and enjoyment’, during her lifetime; and it is also clear from the language of that same sentence, that her right to dispose of corpus was likewise confined to the limited purposes of her comfortable support and enjoyment, with the privilege of determining in her discretion what she desired to use for her comfortable support and enjoyment during her lifetime.
“Therefore, there were two limitations on her right to the use of income and to her right to dispose of corpus under the terms of the Will, namely: (a) any use or disposition by her must have been made for the limited purposes of her comfortable support and enjoyment, which was a personal use limited to her and to her only; and (b) the use of income or the disposition of corpus must have been made by her for her comfortable support and enjoyment during her lifetime or while she lived. That this was the intention of the testator clearly appears from Item 8 of the Will which reads as follows:
‘Eighth: After payment of my debts and funeral expenses, and the special legacies, bequests and devises hereinabove provided, and after the death of my said wife, Pearl Hays Stone, I do give, devise and bequeath all the rest and residue of my property and estate then remaining, of whatsoever kind or nature the same may he, to my heirs at law and next of kin under thé Statute of Distribution of the State of South Carolina, it being my will that said rest and residue of my property and estate shall be distributed in accordance with the laws of Descent and Distribution of Intestate Estates in force in the State of South Carolina at the time of my death.’
(Emphasis added.)
“If Mrs. Stone or her estate could now dispose of any part of the income or corpus of Mr. Stone’s estate, which she had not used for the limited purposes above mentioned *299during her lifetime, it could completely destroy or vitiate the above-quoted Item 8 and thereby render that item totally ineffective and of no benefit to the testator’s heirs, to whom, there can be no doubt, he intended to give, after the death of Mrs. Stone (and after payment of the specific legacies as specified in Items 4 and 6 of the Will), ‘all the rest and residue of my property and estate then remaining, of whatsoever kind or nature the same may be’, which expression of necessity includes corpus and accumulated income, if any, which may not have been used by Mrs. Stone for the limited purposes of her comfortable support and enjoyment during her lifetime as specified in the Will.
“Item 12 of the Will further supports this conclusion. That item reads in part as follows:
‘It is not my desire that my properties be sacrificed in order that a final settlement of my estate be made. My executrix is empowered to sell any and all of my property, real and personal, wheresoever located, at such time and on such terms as she may deem advisable. I desire, however, and recommend that in so far as may be practicable my property to be divided in kind amongst my legatees aii¡d devises named in my will according to the interests and amounts devised and bequeathed unto them respectively.’ (Emphasis added.)
“It must be remembered that this is not a case of a straight life estate with no restrictions on the use of income. It is a situation where the life tenant was empowered to manage the corpus and use only so much of the income earned as well as only so much of the corpus as was necessary to provide her with comfortable support and enjoyment during her lifetime. But at her death all the remainder of the estate, including both corpus and income not consumed by her for the limited purposes to which she was restricted by Mr. Stone’s Will, went over to his heirs under Item 8 of the Will above quoted.
*300“Mrs. Stone was given the right to use either corpus or income, or both, for her comfortable support and enjoyment; but until she chose to withdraw any funds or other assets for either of those limited purposes, such funds and assets remained a part of Mr. Stone’s estate and her rights therein never became vested in her so as to pass under her Will.”
In reaching his conclusion, the trial judge properly relied upon the following authorities and quoted from the same at length: Hamrick v. Marion, 176 S. C. 361, 180 S. E. 213; Blakely v. Blakely, 155 S. C. 123, 152 S. E. 24, 47 A. L. R. (3d) 1082, 31 C. J. S. Estates § 41(6); and 51 Am. Jur. (2d), Life Tenants and Remandermen, § § 57, 106, 107 and 108.
I would remand the case to the lower court for the purpose of carrying out the order of the circuit judge.