Court Opinion

ID: 9566478
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:39:52.895121+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:37:45.822142
License: Public Domain

SPENCE, J.
I dissent.
Section 70 of the Probate Code is clear and unambiguous. It provides, in effect, that a will executed before the marriage of a testator is not revoked by the marriage if “the spouse is provided for in the will.” Emma Blackburn, now Emma Blackburn Poisl, became the spouse of the testator after the execution of the will, but the will specifically devised and bequeathed certain real and personal property to her. Therefore she was “provided for in the will,” and the marriage did not effect a revocation.
Those courts which have construed provisions similar in material respects to section 70, have been unwilling to en-graft additional requirements upon the clear and unambiguous language of their statutes, and therefore have held that it is sufficient that provision be made in a will for a spouse identified by her maiden name. Nothing need appear in the will indicating that at the time of its execution the testator contemplated his marriage to the named beneficiary. (In re Steele's Estate, 45 Wn.2d 58 [273 P.2d 235]; In re Adler's Estate, 52 Wash. 539 [100 P. 1019].) It was so held in a well-reasoned opinion in Estate of Appenfelder, 99 Cal.App. 330 [278 P. 473], and the Legislature thereafter reenacted the former section when it adopted the Probate Code.
The majority opinion would disapprove the Appenfelder case by reasoning from a supposed analogy between the situation here and that presented in certain cases involving an entirely different provision of the section. (Estate of Duke, 41 Cal.2d 509 [261 P.2d 235]; Estate of Axcelrod, 23 Cal.2d 761 [147 P.2d 1].) The last-mentioned provision declares that the will is not revoked if the spouse is “in such way mentioned therein as to show an intention not to make such provision.” In other words, that portion of the section deals solely with the subject of intentional disinheritance; and the last cited cases deal with situations where the spouse was neither “provided for” or “mentioned” by name in the will. There is *152no analogy whatever between the two situations. In ray opinion, the plain provisions of the section should be followed, and the Appenfelder case should not be disapproved.
I would affirm the judgment.
Respondents’ petition for a rehearing was denied April 13, 1955. Spence, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted.