Court Opinion

ID: 9810848
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 22:01:32.329234+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:40:16.563110
License: Public Domain

*28Walker, J.,
concurring in the result. I concur fully in the decision of the Court in this case that there should be a new trial, and for the reasons so clearly and conclusively stated by Justice Connor; but, as I do not think it is necessary to pass upon the competency of the question which the caveators’ counsel asked the witness, Dr. John G. Blount, as to the mental capacity of the testator, the appeal having been disposed of by other rulings, I am unwilling to commit myself to the correctness of the decision upon the question so put to the medical experts. I prefer to consider and decide that matter when it is necessary to do so, and after a careful study and examination of it in the light of the precedents. As at present advised, I am strongly inclined to the opinion that the question was incompetent, as the witness was called upon to give an answer which, if it was acted upon by the jury, would have decided the issue for them instead of leaving the ultimate fact of mental capacity, which was the very substance of the issue, to be found by the jury upon a review of the evidence, and so that tire conclusion when reached would have been that of the jury and not the mere adoption of the opinion of the witness. A witness may testify to the mental condition and the mental and physical characteristics of the person whose mental capacity is in question,- but it seems tome that he should not be permitted to give an opinion as to whether he has or has not sufficient mental capacity to execute a will or a deed, for this is a mixed question of law and fact, and, besides, the question in its scope is as broad as the issue itself.
As I understand the law in regard to expert and opinion evidence, such a question is forbidden because the witness must pronounce upon the law', and, besides, in answering the question he would be exercising a function which, under our system of jurisprudence, belongs exclusively to the jury. He passes beyond the limit prescribed for such evidence and *29enters the domain of fact and law instead of opinion merely. While I have had little time to investigate the subject, it seems to me that the views which I have expressed are fully sustained by the cases of Smith v. Smith, 117 N. C., 326, and Clary v. Clary, 24 N. C., 78. In the first of those eases the witness testified that “no power on earth could influence the vendor,” whose deed was alleged to have been procured by undue influence. The Court held this to be incompetent as the equivalent of an opinion upon the very fact in issue, and as comprehensive as the issue itself, citing Clary v. Clary, supra. The cases of Smith v. Smith and Clary v. Clary, and also McDougald v. McLean, 60 N. C., 120, are in perfect harmony, when they are considered with reference to the special facts of each of them, and they do not, in my opinion, sustain the decision of the Court upon a question similar to the one we are now discussing, in Whitaker v. Hamilton, 126 N. C., 465. In Clary v. Clary the witness was not required to express his opinion as to whether the vendor had sufficient mental capacity to execute the bill of sale, but his testimony related solely to her general mental condition, and his answer did not by any means necessarily imply that she did not have mental capacity sufficient for that purpose. Weakness of mind merely is not the same as mental incapacity to execute an instrument. It may be some evidence to show the existence of the latter, but does not exclude the idea of its nonexistence. What was said by Judge Gaston in Clary v. Clary must be considered in relation to the particular question asked the witness in that case, and had reference to mental condition or soundness and not to mental capacity, which is quite a different thing, as shown in Rogers on Expert Testimony (2d Ed.), p. 164, sec. 69, where it is said that the “weight of authority is opposed to allowing the witness to express an opinion as to whether an individual had the mental capacity to dispose of his property by will or deed.”
*30In Lawson on Expert and Opinion Evidence (2d Ed.), p. 155, the rule is thus stated: “Oapacitv to make a will is not a simple question of fact. It is a conclusion which the law draws from certain facts as premises. Hence it is improper to ask and obtain the opinion of even a physician as to the capacity of any one to make a will. Under our system that question was addressed to the jury. All evidence which tended to shed light on his mental status, the clearness and soundness of his intellectual powers, should have gone before them. This being done, however, the witness should not have been made to invade the province of the jury.” See also Walker v. Walker, 34 Ala., 470; In re Arnold, 14 Hun., 525 ; Reg. v. Richards, Fos. & Fin., 87, and Fairchild v. Bascom, 35 Vt, 416, citing Crowell v. Kirk, 14 N. C., 356, in which Judge Ruffin says: “As far as we perceive the meaning (of the question) we suppose the attempt was to get the opinion of the witness, whether the supposed testator had capacity to make a will. * * * If this was the purpose of the inquiry it was properly refused, for the witness is not to decide udrat constitutes mental capacity or a disposing mind and memory, that being a matter of legal definition. He might state the degree of intelligence or imbecility in the best way he could, so as to impart, to the Court and jury the knowledge of his meaning, that they might ascertain udrat was the state of the testator’s nrincl and memory; but whether that was adequate to the disposition of his property by, will did not rest in the opinion of the witness.” Judge Daniel, who wrote the -opinion of the Court in Crowell v. Kirk, says, at page 357: “The defendant’s counsel asked his own witness, Harris, if in his opinion the testator was capable of making a will-; an objection being made, the witness was not permitted to answer the question. I do not think that the Judge erred in this. The opinions of witnesses in England are confined to persons of science, art or skill in some particular *31branch of business, and they have to give the reasons upon which their opinions are founded. All other witnesses are to state the facts, and the jury make up their opinions on the facts thus deposed to. In this country the Courts have said that the law placed the subscribing witness about the testator to ascertain and judge of his capacity. B-ut no case has gone the length of permitting the evidence of opinion offered in this case to go to the jury.” The case last cited, it seems, is directly in point and explains what is said in Clary v. Clary, so as to reconcile that case with the authorities.
But the evidence of the witness in this case is more objectionable than would be that of an expert who had personal knowledge of the facts upon which he bases his opinion, and the latter is, as we have seen, incompetent to give such testimony. The witnesses, Dr. Blount and Dr. S'. T. Nicholson, whose evidence was substantially the same, were permitted to testify that if the jury found the testator manifested certain symptoms and conditions stated in the hypothetical question, lie did not have mental capacity sufficient to make a will. Medical experts, who have never seen the testator or observed his symptoms or general mental and physical condition and characteristics, testify not as to the effect which the disease of which these symptoms are indicative was likely to have upon the testator’s mind or memory or upon his general mental or physical condition, which are strictly matters of opinion and proper subjects of expert testimony, but they depose to a fact, upon evidence at second hand, and superadd their opinion upon the law applicable to those facts. This, it seems to me, is a clear violation of the rule relating to such testimony.