Court Opinion

ID: 4916654
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2021-09-22 00:10:31.148775+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:13:53.360602
License: Public Domain

Taylor, J.,
(concurring.) I concur in the conclusion reached in this case for the following reasons: The power to alienate any species of property by last will and testament has never been an inherent right in the citizen, but one that is derived from legislation, and is at all times subject to legislative control, and may at any time be altogether taken away by legislative act. In the history of this State, as early as November 20th, 1828, every person of the age of twenty-one years was empowered, by an act of the legislature then passed to dispose of property real and personal by last will and testament, and thus has the law stood from that day down to the present time. Section 1792 Revised Statutes of 1892. I do not think that it was the design of Section 4 of Article X of our Constitution of 1885, to curtail or impose any limitations or restrictions upon the power of the legislature over the general subject of the alienation of property by last will and testament, except that it in express terms makes the homestead inalienable by will when the holder thereof has *343children in esse. Of course the legislature cannot interfere with this status given by the organic law to the homestead of a holder having children. The constitution inhibits its alienation by will when the holder has children, and the legislature is without power,- contra to the constitution, to empower him to do so; but the language of said section 4 of the constitution is carefully and somewhat peculiarly chosen. It expressly and carefully confines anyone construing it to its own terms and provisions. Its language is: “Nothing in this article shall be construed to prevent the holder of a homestead, if he be without children, from disposing of his or her homestead by will in a manner prescribed by law.” This is equivalent to saying: “None of the provisions in this article of this constitution shall be held to prevent the holder of a homestead who is without children from alienating the same by will, but although this constitution does not so prevent, yet the legislature is left free to prevent it, or to impose such limitations and conditions upon such an alienation of it, in the absence of children, as it may see proper.” In other words, the constitution neither permits nor prevents the disposal of the homestead by will, when the holder is without children, but the legislature is left free to deal with the subject as it sees proper. This the legislature has done by Chapter 4730 Laws of 1S99, whereby the homestead is made inalienable by will when the holder thereof is survived by a widow. 'This act, I think, is entirely constitutional.