Court Opinion

ID: 9754211
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 19:50:23.800928+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:50.711558
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Mr. Justice Bell:
The scrivener of this will omitted to insert a direction or provision for the payment of taxes. It is therefore difficult to determine testatrix’s intent with respect thereto.
Precedents are rarely controlling in will cases be-, cause each will must be interpreted from its four corners and no will has a twin brother: Newlin Estate, 367 Pa. 527, 80 A. 2d 819. Testatrix directed that her residuary estate be divided into 12 equal shares or parts and gave the first 3 such shares to her cousin, Sarah M. Jones, and the next 3 such shares to relatives and friends; and the next 6 such shares to charitable or*388ganizations. She obviously wished them, as she specifically said, to share her estate equally, certainly after she had named her cousin and other relatives first, no one could seriously contend that she intended to prefer the charities to them* — yet that is the effect of the majority opinion. Testatrix, like every other wealthy American, knew that her taxes would be enormous and there is nothing in her will to indicate that she wanted her relatives (and friends) to pay all these taxes, viz.: $450,000., and to receive a small fraction of the l/12th equal share or other equal share she specifically gave them, while the charities pay (virtually) no taxes and receive their l/12th share or other equal share in full. I believe she intended that her debts, funeral expenses, taxes and specific and pecuniary legacies should be paid and whatever was left should, as she specifically said, be divided into 12 equal shares or parts and the charities should receive 6 equal parts or shares and her cousin should receive 3 equal parts or shares and her other relatives and friends should similarly receive (3) equal parts or shares and not, as the majority hold, a fraction thereof.
This equal distribution is eminently fair** and I believe is in exact accord with the testatrix’s general *389and specific intent as disclosed by the scheme and the language of her will.
For these reasons, I would hold that testatrix has “otherwise directed in her will” as required by the Act of July 2,1937, and the taxes should be paid out of the residuary estate before distribution.
Mr. Justice Musmanno joins in this dissenting opinion.

 Cf: Wood’s Estate, 321 Pa. 164, 184 A. 113, in which Mr. Chief Justice Kephakt stated the law as follows: “Where ambiguous . . . expressions appear in a will, the law adheres as closely as possible to the general rule of inheritance and favors the heir or next of kin in preference to strangers. This is a rule of universal application.”

 Our cases have applied the equitable principle of equality of distribution in many instances — Cf: Lewis’s Appeal, 89 Pa. 509; Lochrie’s Estate, 340 Pa. 145, 16 A. 2d 133; Laughlin Estate, 354 Pa. 43, 46 A. 2d 477 — on the theory that a testator is presumed, in the absence of expressed intent to the contrary, to intend that his heirs should share his estate equally. This would seem particularly applicable where, as here, testator gave his residuary estate in equal shares to his next of kin and charities.