Court Opinion

ID: 9594927
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:33:59.713442+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:43:06.676244
License: Public Domain

Birdsong, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
1. OCGA § 53-6-24, as amended, provides that in the granting of letters of administration, the following rules “shall be observed . . . (1) The surviving spouse . . . shall be first entitled, unless an action for divorce or separate maintenance was pending between the deceased and the surviving spouse at the time of the death; (2) The next of kin, at the time of the death, according to the law declaring relationship and distribution, shall be next entitled. . . .”
The majority has concluded that Sullivan, as surviving spouse is, “according to the law declaring relationship and distribution” (id.), Mrs. Sullivan’s “next of kin” entitled to inherit even though he is disqualified from serving as administrator, and therefore that Mrs. Sullivan’s family, the McClintons, cannot be her next of kin entitled to inherit and “ ‘interested as distributees of the estate.’ ” See Smith v. Goodwin, 84 Ga. App. 319, 322-323 (66 SE2d 169).
In the majority’s view, the legislature, in amending OCGA § 53-6-24 to disqualify a surviving spouse as administrator when there is a divorce action pending, created a “glitch” in the statutory scheme, because under the law as to order of inheritance a surviving spouse is still entitled to inherit as the next of kin; and as “ ‘the person entitled to the estate of [the] decedent [he] is entitled to the administration.’ ” Roe v. Pitts, 82 Ga. App. 770, 773-774 (62 SE2d 387).
I think any conflict in the statute is illusory. While looking for the legislature’s intention in amending or enacting any law, we are not authorized to presume the legislature was unaware of co-existing laws. In amending OCGA § 53-6-24 to disqualify a divorcing spouse as administrator and to mandate that the “next entitled” shall be the “next of kin, at the time of death, according to the law declaring relationship and distributions,” the legislature was indisputably aware that until a divorce is final an intestate deceased’s surviving spouse is still a distributee of the estate and is entitled to inherit as the “next of kin.”
It is obvious, therefore, that by disqualifying the divorcing spouse from serving as administrator and then stating that “the next of kin . . . shall be next entitled,” the legislature was referring to the deceased’s “next of kin” after the surviving spouse.
Any other construction renders meaningless § 53-6-24 (a) (2). It works an unnatural and unreasonable result and leads to “ ‘absurd or wholly impracticable consequences.’ ” Hollowell v. Jove, 247 Ga. 678, *415681 (279 SE2d 430). If the majority’s reasoning were correct, subparagraph (a) (2) would never take effect: the divorcing spouse, though not entitled to be administrator under (a) (1), would still be the deceased’s “next of kin according to the law declaring relationship and distribution” and thus would be entitled to be administrator under subparagraph (a) (2), which is of course impossible because subparagraph (a) (1) disqualified him; and so the circle goes.
We cannot conclude such an absurd and impracticable “Catch 22” consequence was intended. Without doubt, the legislature intended that the “next of kin” which it referred to as entitled to be administrator in § 53-6-24 (a) (2) is the “next of kin according to the law declaring relationship and distribution” after the surviving spouse has been disqualified.
Smith v. Goodwin, supra at 323, is cited by the majority for the idea that the “next of kin” referred to in subparagraph (a) (2) are the “ ‘next of kin . . . interested as distributees of the estate,’ ” which the McClintons can never be so long as Sullivan is the surviving spouse. That case was written long before the legislature disqualified the next of kin who is a surviving spouse when there is a pending divorce, and so it does not address this question. Moreover, the persons seeking to be administrators of Mr. Tutt’s estate in that case were disqualified because they were not the next of kin of the deceased. They were the next of kin of the next of kin of the deceased; they were siblings of Mrs. Tutt, who died shortly after Mr. Tutt died, and they were opposed by the siblings of the deceased Mr. Tutt. They were “merely heirs of [Mr. Tutt’s] wife and as such [were] not heirs of the estate under consideration.” Id. at 323.
The entirety of § 53-6-24 is a list of priority as to the appointment of administrator and is not an attempt to change the laws of distribution, nor does the proper interpretation of it advocated herein change the laws of distribution. There is no conflict in it. When one entity is disqualified or not present, the next candidate steps forward. In this case, Sullivan being disqualified as administrator by § 53-6-24 (a) (1), the next “next of kin according to the law of relationship and distribution” are the McClintons.
Although appellee Sullivan indicates that McClinton is not suited to be administrator, the probate court may determine the validity of such argument only after it has applied the proper law entitling McClinton to the post according to the statute. Whether there is anything in the estate to “administer” is beside the point. If as Sullivan contends there is nothing in the estate, the less significant may be any alleged derelictions of McClinton while he served as temporary administrator.
2. The majority indicates in a footnote that Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan signed prenuptial and postnuptial agreements in which Sullivan *416renounced any interest in Mrs. Sullivan’s estate, and that these documents are in the record but are not properly “authenticated” and “never properly offered as evidence for the purpose of summary judgment.” However, OCGA § 9-11-56 (c) does not pose such requirements. Although Mr. McClinton proffered them, it does not appear their existence was disputed by Sullivan; that they were introduced by McClinton, rather than by the person who signed them, does not mean they were not properly authenticated or offered. They are in the record and it does not appear Mr. Sullivan has disavowed their existence or asserts the signatures on them are not his or his former wife’s. They are proper evidence of record which must be considered by the trial court when they are raised in issue. If this judgment against McClinton were reversed and the case were remanded for further proceedings, our law is clear that any issue touching on these prenuptial and postnuptial agreements may be properly raised, including their proper authentication or competence as evidence.
Sullivan argues that it is somehow “inconsistent” for the Mc-Clintons to contend these documents are valid so as to prove Sullivan has no claim, when their daughter had contended they were invalid in her divorce proceedings. I perceive this to be some sort of “equity” argument but I am not led astray. Assuming the validity of the agreements is a proper issue to be determined by the probate court in this proceeding, nothing prohibits McClinton from contending they are valid so as to prevent Sullivan from claiming that he is a distributee of the estate and is “next of kin” under § 53-6-24 (a) (2).
That his daughter once claimed their invalidity so as to enable her to share in the marital estate does not, in this administratorship dispute, force McClinton to concede the same, especially if this would enable Sullivan to claim that, although he is disqualified to serve as administrator, he is still the next of kin, thereby to prevent the deceased’s father from administratorship. The real irony here lies in Sullivan’s attempt to claim as invalid, so as to prevent Mrs. Sullivan’s next of kin from his statutory entitlement of administrator of her estate, what he claimed in the divorce proceedings were valid so as to prevent her from sharing in the marital proceeds.
3. Even assuming the majority’s interpretation of § 53-6-24 (a) (2) were correct, the case should be remanded for proper consideration of the validity of the prenuptial and postnuptial agreements insofar as Sullivan renounced in them any interest in Mrs. Sullivan’s estate, which would make McClinton her “next of kin” even under the majority’s view of § 53-6-24 (a) (2). There is no equity which would allow Sullivan to contend they are invalid so as to prevent McClinton’s administratorship, when Sullivan asserted their validity to prevent Mrs. Sullivan from sharing in the marital estate.
Accordingly, I respectfully dissent on three grounds. I am author*417ized to state that Chief Judge Pope, Judge Cooper and Judge Blackburn join in this dissent.
Decided March 19, 1993 —
Reconsideration denied April 2, 1993
Louis Levenson & Associates, Louis' Levenson, for appellant.
Vincent, Chorey, Taylor & Feil, John L. Taylor, Jr., Mildred A. Hankins, for appellee.