Court Opinion

ID: 9594901
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:33:51.92166+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:00:49.684604
License: Public Domain

Gabfield, J.
(dissenting) — I respectfully dissent from Division I of the majority opinion.
I think the question whether there was a family relationship was for the jury, not the court, and claimants’ motion to strike this defense was properly overruled. Claimants’ argument there is no evidence to support this defense is largely based on the fact decedent was sick and therefore unable to render reciprocal-services. We have never held such inability is fatal, as a matter of law, to the defense of family relationship. In fact we have held to the contrary. It is merely one of the elements to be considered by the jury in determining the existence of such a relationship.
In many eases of this kind where an adult son or daughter nursed an ailing parent unable to render reciprocal services we have held it was for the jury to determine whether the defense of family relationship should prevail. No authority cited by able counsel for claimants or by the majority supports the position that decedent’s inability to render reciprocal services deprived the administrator as a matter of law of the defense of family relationship.
Yoder v. Engelbert, 155 Iowa 515, 518, 136 N.W. 522, 523, cited by the majority (but not by claimants), perhaps needs some explanation. On appeal it was there contended the gratuitous character of the services as a member of decedent’s family should have been submitted to the jury. We held there was no error because there was no such issue in the ease and also because of “the theory upon which the case was defended in the trial court * * The administrator admitted decedent intended to *530pay claimant but alleged $2 per week was the agreed compensation and this had been fully paid.
In re Estate of Squire (Gaynor, J.), 168 Iowa 597, 607, 608, 150 N.W. 706, 709, is directly opposed to the principal contention claimants make on this branch of the case. Decedent there was older and more helpless than Mike Klepper was here. She died at ninety-four, Klepper at seventy-eight. She had had a paralytic stroke and could not care for herself. We reversed the trial court’s allowance of the claim and held: “We do not think that the fact that no services were rendered by Mrs. Squire, or the fact that she was incapable of rendering services, authorized the conclusion that her support was not gratuitously provided for by the plaintiff.”
In re Estate of Squire, supra, is cited with approval in Snyder v. Nixon, 188 Iowa 779, 782, 783, 176 N.W. 808, 809 (which the majority cites), where we said: “It does not appear that deceased did any work, or that any work was exacted of him. There were no reciprocal services exacted or rendered, nor was he capable of rendering reciprocal services, in even the slightest degree, during the time he remained with plaintiff. These facts may not he sufficient in themselves to overcome the presumption (see In re Estate of Squire, 168 Iowa 597), yet they have probative force, and are entitled to be considered by the jury in determining the ultimate question as to whether or not there was an intention on his part to compensate for the services rendered, and they have some probative force in negativing the thought that the services were rendered with no intention on his part to compensate his dmghter therefor.” (Emphasis added.)
Substantially the whole statement just quoted again appears in In re Estate of Kleinhesselink, 230 Iowa 1090, 1093, 1094, 300 N.W. 315, 317.
In Sheldon v. Thornburg, 153 Iowa 622, 629, 133 N.W. 1076, 1078, decedent sent for an adult sister to come to Perry from the latter’s home in Keokuk to care for decedent who was “very sick.” Upon appeal by the administrator it was contended the jury should have been instructed as a matter of law the services were gratuitously furnished by a member of the family and *531claimant could not recover in the absence of an express contract to pay for ber services. We held tbe trial court was right in refusing so to instruct as a matter of law and said:
“It is true that, the attendance by one sister at the sick bed of another, and the rendition of such aid as may naturally and properly be prompted by sisterly affection and' solicitude may ordinarily be presumed to be gratuitous, but, the service rendered may also be of such character and extent and performed under such circumstances as to exclude the idea of gratuity, and justify a finding that compensation therefor was contemplated by both parties.- The evidence in this respect was not so clear or decisive as to make the question one for the court.”
See also Soderland v. Graeber, 190 Iowa 765, 775, 776, 180 N.W. 745.
Claimants also contend there is no evidence of a family relationship because Henry had left the parental home, gone out into the world, married, reared a family of his own and returned to care for his father. Eeliance is placed upon the dictum the majority quotes from Marietta v. Marietta, 90 Iowa 201, 204, 57 N.W. 708, and upon In re Estate of Bishop, 130 Iowa 250, 106 N.W. 637, and Clark v. Krogh, 225 Iowa 479, 280 N.W. 635, which the majority cites.
None of these precedents supports the holding the question' of family relationship should not have been submitted to the jury here. Each of them holds merely that such issue was for the,jury (or the court where a jury was waived). This is also true of In re Estate of Talty, 232 Iowa 280, 5 N.W.2d 584, 144 A. L. R. 859, where the trial court directed a verdict .against claimant on the ground' there was a family relationship as a matter of law. We reversed the ease because (1) there was no issue of family relationship pleaded and (2) such relationship did not appear as a matter of law.
Claimants make no other contention in support of their position that the family relationship question should not have been submitted to the jury. They do not argue that the making of the leases conclusively negatives such a relationship.
If the trial court rightly overruled claimants’ motion to strike the defense of family relationship (i.e., if this defense *532was for tbe jury, not tbe court), there is clearly no basis for bolding instructions 7 and 11 were not prejudicial to appellant. In Wilson v. Else, 204 Iowa 857, 216 N.W. 33, cited by the majority, tbe claimant appealed because he thought the verdict for him was inadequate and we held, very properly, instructions which permitted recovery on issues not pleaded by him were not prejudicial to claimant.
Here this appellant was greatly prejudiced by instructions 7 and 11 which permitted claimants to recover upon an- issue qioi pleaded and which it is conceded there is no evidence to support, i.e., “That there was an express agreement by which decedent was to pay for such services.” For all we know, under these instructions this verdict for $14,300 rests upon a jury finding that decedent expressly agreed to pay for claimants’ services when it is conceded there is no pleading or evidence of any such agreement. Appellant’s objections, to these instructions upon this ground were clearly pointed out to the trial court and are argued here. Claimants’ counsel do not attempt to defend the instructions against the attack upon them.
Citation of authority should not be needed to support the conclusion instructions 7 and 11 are reversible error as appellant contends. However, these are among the many authorities that support such conclusion in addition to Pierce v. Heusinkveld, 234 Iowa 1348, 1351, 14 N.W.2d 275, 277, and Jakeway v. Allen, 227 Iowa 1182, 1189, 1190, 290 N.W. 507, cited by the majority: Porter v. Decker, 222 Iowa 1109, 1112-1114, 270 N.W. 897; Isaacs v. Bruce, 218 Iowa 759, 762, 763, 254 N.W. 57; Simmons v. Chicago, R. I. & P. R. Co., 217 Iowa 1277, 1282, 252 N.W. 516; Ritter v. City of Fort Madison, 212 Iowa 564, 569, 570, 234 N.W. 814; Tabler v. Evans, 202 Iowa 1386, 212 N.W. 161; Barce v. City of Shenandoah, 106 Iowa 426, 429, 76 N.W. 747; 53 Am. Jur., Trial, section 574, page 453 (“No instruction should be given * * # which tenders an issue that is not presented by the pleadings or supported by the evidence ***.”); 64 C. J., Trial, section 657.
See also In re Estate of Hurlbut, 242 Iowa 353, 359, 360, 46 N.W.2d 66, 70 (“The foregoing portions of instruction 3 constitute .reversible error. * * * With no basis in the evidence *533any finding on these matters would be based on surmise.”); Jaeger v. Hackert, 241 Iowa 379, 386, 41 N.W.2d 42, 46; Smith v. Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co., 231 Iowa 278, 1 N.W.2d 225.
Porter v. Decker, supra, states (at page 1114 of 222 Iowa) : “It seems elementary that only such matters can be submitted to a jury as are contained in the pleadings and as to which evidence has been presented * * *. It will not do to say that such an instruction was without prejudice.”
I also think the portion of instruction 5 quoted by the majority near the beginning of its Division I is erroneous upon the ground urged by appellant. Its effect is to deprive him of the defense of family relationship unless he performed his “duty to return services fairly proportional to those received.” Some of the authorities that support appellant’s objection to this instruction are herein discussed in the consideration of claimants’ contention there can be no family relationship without reciprocal services. Instruction 5 is directly contrary to In re Estate of Squire, supra, 168 Iowa 597, 607, 150 N.W. 706, and Snyder v. Nixon, supra, 188 Iowa 779, 782, 783, 176 N.W. 808.
I would reverse.
Bliss and Thompson, JJ., join in this dissent.