Court Opinion

ID: 5454230
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-01-08 19:51:27.218508+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:32:34.420440
License: Public Domain

McFARLAND, J.
I dissent. I see no sufficient reason for disturbing the judgment. Waiving the point made by respondent that the alleged trust was void from the beginning because it is not taken out of the category of perpetuities by being a charity, and other points going to its intrinsic invalidity, I think that the findings that the accomplishment of the purposes of the trust has become impossible, and that said purposes have been abandoned, are just conclusions from the facts. In fact, the evidence does not present a single existing monument to mark any effort to carry out the purpose of the trust; and, so far as the accomplishment of that purpose is concerned, the situation is the same to-day as it was the day *524Mr. Spence executed the deed. All that the trustees have apparently done has been to collect the rents from the trust property, and take care of said property, and to make some money on the purchase and sale of a couple of lenses—which money does not seem to be now on hand. Shortly after the execution of the deed—on April 8, 1889—the trustees authorized Clark, of Boston, to contract with a party in Paris for disks for a forty-inch' telescope at a certain price, part payments to be made at different times. In order to make the first payment, the trustees mortgaged the trust property to the State Loan and Trust Company. When the second payment became due there was no money to meet it. Two lenses were then in the possession of Clark, of Boston. Nothing was done toward making the second payment. It was apparent that the trust property was not of sufficient value to carry out the scheme, which contemplated one of the largest telescopes ever made. One of the witnesses, who was a trustee and president of the university, testified that he asked Mr. Spence if it would not be better to sell the lenses, and commence again with such a contract as the property would carry out; and that he said, “I think it would.” But before his death he wrote a letter to the said witness, in which is the following: “In a conversation once had with you regarding the sale of the glass, it was my mind always that the purchasers should erect it somewhere near here. I fear that you did not so understand it. When I deeded the property, I hoped; of course, that I would have nothing more in the way of business to attend to except to designate the site. It seems now that the trustees will have trouble in raising the money to pay for the glass, something like $18,000. I would not be satisfied with any smaller glass in connection with the university. If Raymond, Lowe or Clark would guaranty to erect it upon some one of our peaks, I think I would favor liberal terms with either of those men. If you think none of these points are advisable, it might be well to redeed the property back to me, and I will pay the price of the glass as per contract, and await further developments or future combinations, whereby we may yet be successful in securing for the university that object which w;e have so long cherished.” Nothing further was done before his death; and about two months after that event the three remaining trustees, or one or more of them, sold their interest in the lenses which had arrived in Boston *525to the Chicago University for $9,500, and closed out the contract which Clark had made for them. With part of this money they satisfied the mortgage given to the State Loan and Trust Company; so that they then stood as they did at the beginning, except that, as they had paid only $3,912 on the lenses, they made a profit on that transaction. The three remaining trustees have taken no further steps to carry out the purpose of the trust; they have not asked to have other trustees appointed; they have selected no site; they have, as the testimony of one of them shows, admittedly abandoned Wilson’s Peak as a site, because there is no road there, and to either construct a road or to transport materials by a bridle-path would be impracticable. The most that can be said on the subject in their behalf is that perhaps at some indefinite period in the future, if the trust property shall become more valuable, and Professor Lowe shall complete a railroad to the summit of another mountain, they might possibly erect some kind of an observatory at some point on the latter mountain.
Moreover, how can this trust be now executed so as to carry out the purpose of the trustor? The clear purpose was to erect a first-class observatory. This is apparent from the language of the deed and from the acts of the parties. The trustees recognized that purpose when they entered into a contract for the purchase of lens for a forty-inch telescope—said to be larger than any heretofore constructed; and the trustor declared- that he would not be contented with a smaller one, and suggested that the property be deeded back to him. It was found that the trust property was entirely insufficient in value to accomplish that scheme. Again, the site was to be approved by the trustor; and that is impossible, for he is dead. Furthermore, special confidence was evidently placed in the persons named as trustees, of whom the trustor himself was one, and the concurrence of four of them was necessary to important and essential acts, and particular powers were given to Trustee Bovard; but three of the trustees, including Bovard, are dead, and there are not four left.
It is contended that at least one of the difficulties caused by the death of the trustees may be obviated under section 2287 of the Civil Code, which provides that the superior court may appoint a trustee when there is a vacancy, and the declaration of trust provides no method of appointment. That section is a mere statement of the power which courts of equity have *526always exercised in proper cases. A court of equity will not allow a trust to fail solely for want of a trustee; that is, if the purposes of a trust and the wishes of a trustor can be carried out by the appointment of a trustee, the court will make such appointment, even though no trustee at all had ever been appointed by the trustor. But where, as in the case at bar, the trustor has himself selected the persons who are to execute the trust, and has evidently placed special personal confidence in them, with a reasonable expectation that the material parts of the trust would be executed during their lives, and no steps have been taken toward such execution, and no equitable rights have grown up under their acts, there a court will not undertake to substitute strangers for the chosen agents of the trustor. In Re Hinckley's Estate, supra, this court said: “If it is determined that a peculiar personal trust and confidence were intended, new trustees will not be appointed,” citing authorities. “In such cases the appointment of new trustees is refused when it appears from the will that the testator intended that none but the persons by him named should be intrusted with the power. ’ ’ And in the case at bar all the circumstances point to a personal confidence reposed in the persons selected to carry out the trust. The fact that no successors were provided for is itself significant, although, of course, not conclusive; but there can be no doubt that such special confidence was reposed in at least two of the trustees— Bovard and the trustor himself—and they are both dead. Would a court undertake to substitute strangers for these two, when there are no equities in favor of the named beneficiary, or any other person, arising out of any valuable consideration f It must be remembered that this was a purely -voluntary trust, and that no complications have arisen by any attempt to execute it. Moreover, under such circumstances, where the purposes of the trust have failed, and cannot be accomplished according to the intent of the trustor, new trustees will not be appointed to carry out some plan other than the one which he designed. In such case the property reverts to the trustor or his estate: 1 Perry on Trusts, sec. 160; Easterbrooks v. Tillinghast, 5 Gray (Mass.),21; Keith v. Copeland, 138 Mass. 303. And, as we have before stated, no observatory such as the trustor contemplated can be erected, and no site can be selected in the manner provided by the deed.
*527Under the foregoing views, other findings assailed by appellants are immaterial. In my opinion, the judgment and order appealed from should be affirmed.