Court Opinion

ID: 9622360
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:16:02.552318+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:15.894004
License: Public Domain

HUNTER, JR., Robert N., Judge,
concurring.
With regard to the application of cy pres, I reach the same result as the majority through a slightly different logic, which may have some importance to a future application of the doctrine of cy pres. Under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 36C-1-112 (2009), “[t]he rules of construction that apply in this State to the interpretation of and disposition of property by will also apply as appropriate to the interpretation of the terms of a trust and the disposition of the trust property.” The court below, in my view, erred in selecting Station Assoc., Inc. v. Dare County, 350 N.C. 367, 513 S.E.2d 789 (1999), as authority for the proposition that fee simple ownership of the assets of the Christmas Trust was transferred by virtue of the language of the First Codicil. I disagree with this finding because Dare County concerns the interpretation of a deed and not a will. The majority’s opinion avoids this error.
It is my opinion that the proper construction of the Will in the case sub judice involves the application of the presumption against intestacy, the presumption that a person knows the law, and the consequences of the application of these presumptions to the fact that the testator here failed to include in the Will or the First or Second Codicils a comprehensive residuary clause. Austin v. Austin, 160 N.C. 367, 368, 76 S.E. 272, 272 (1912) (“The presumption is against intestacy.”). As the majority correctly notes, the residuary clause in the Will served as a “final settlement” with the residue beneficiaries upon their reaching the age of twenty-eight. Given the definite time frame for the termination of the accumulation of the residue, it is reasonable, to me, to conclude that Item Eleventh is not comprehensive in its ability to dispose of property acquired by the estate after the “final settlement” date. Thus, since the residuary clause has expired and cannot now devise to the residuary beneficiaries any more property, it is apparent to me that the only manner in which the heirs of *591Joseph Cannon can take the remainder interest in the Christmas Trust is through intestacy.
The need for a court to declare the intent of the testator only arises where there is no direction from the testator. Had the Will contained a more comprehensive residuary clause, even if the clause was not contained within specific language of the First Codicil establishing the Christmas Trust, then I believe such a residuary clause would fully dispose of the remainder interest here at issue. See Ford v. McBrayer, 171 N.C. 420, 88 S.E. 736 (1916) (A “residuary clause . . . disposes of all other property of the testator.”); Hollowell v. Hollowell, 18 N.C. App. 279, 196 S.E.2d 820 (1973) (property devised in codicil subject to residuary clause of effective will). However, as discussed by the majority, the method chosen by Joseph Cannon in Item Eleventh does not comprehensively dispose of the residuary estate.
Appellants argue that this Court should apply a theory of resulting trust to the corpus of the Christmas Trust, which would result in the bank shares constituting the trust to revert to the residuary beneficiaries of the Will. In support of this position, appellants cite The Restatement (First) of Trusts:
Where the owner of property gratuitously transfers it upon a trust which is properly declared but which is fully performed without exhausting the trust estate, the trustee holds the surplus upon a resulting trust for the transferor or his estate, unless the transferor properly manifested an intention that no resulting trust of the surplus should arise.
Restatement (First) of Trusts § 430 (1935).2
However, even if we were to apply this rule in order to achieve the result sought, the trial court would have to determine that part of Joseph Cannon’s estate passed through intestacy. Furthermore, the court would have to ignore the legal presumption that Joseph Cannon did not know the law exigent in 1932, and that he would not have intended this law to be applied in interpreting his intention.
In North Carolina, now and in 1932, there is a presumption against intestacy, and the burden is on an heir claiming intestacy to rebut such a presumption. Austin, 160 N.C. at 368, 76 S.E. at 272. Other than the language of Item Eleventh, there is no evidence intro*592duced by the appellants to rebut the presumption that Joseph Cannon did not intend to dispose of his entire estate through the Will. The contention that the Will, upon the expiration of the Christmas Trust, requires that the corpus of the trust be conveyed to the residuary beneficiaries, supports, rather than rebuts, the application of this presumption.
As this State’s Supreme Court has said, where there is “an important failure to complete the scheme of testamentary disposition so as to provide for contingencies too obvious to be ignored, especially those which might interfere with the expressed testamentary intent with regard to the particular legacy or devise, raises a strong presumption that the testator understood himself to be making a final disposition in his gift of the property.” Coddington v. Stone, 217 N.C. 714, 720, 9 S.E.2d 420, 424 (1940). Having no evidence to the contrary, the trial court here was justified in using this presumption to imply a gift of the corpus to the income beneficiaries.
In my view, there are two classes of possible income beneficiaries of the corpus in this case: the first is the charitable institutions to which the income was given to distribute to their wards, inmates, or employees; and the other is to the wards, inmates, and employees themselves. Because it is my opinion that the disposition of the corpus of the trust to the latter would be “impractical” within the meaning of cy pres, I think that the trial court was justified in applying cy pres and finding that the remainder interest of the trust should be distributed in 2039 among those charitable organizations receiving annual distributions from the Christmas Trust.

. Appellants point out that this provision of the Restatement was published in 1935, three years before the execution of the First Codicil.