Bauernschmidt v. Safe Deposit & Trust Co.

Sloan, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The plaintiff, Nola Luxford Bauernschmidt, a resident of California, caused to be issued, out of the Superior Court of Baltimore City, a foreign attachment against her husband, William Bauernschmidt, Jr., defendant, and laid the writ in the hands of the Safe Deposit & Trust Company of Baltimore City, garnishee, to satisfy a claim of $17,641.90, claimed to be due her under a decree for separate maintenance of the Superior Court of California for Los Angeles County, passed December 7th, 1937. The ³⁵³ garnishee answered the writ by filing a motion to quash, wherein it stated that the defendant “* * * had no attachable interest in the property mentioned in these proceedings; said Safe Deposit & Trust Company of Baltimore is trustee under the wills of Frederick Bauernschmidt and of Margaretha Bauernschmidt. As such trustee, it is required to collect the rents, incomes and profits of the properties mentioned therein and after the payment of expenses, is to pay certain of the rents, income and profits to the defendant,” and “* * * neither the net rents, income and profits nor the corpus of the trust estate thus created being liable to attachment, the defendant has no interest in any property in the hands of the said garnishee which may be made the subject of attachment.” Other reasons were assigned, but as the attachability of the funds in the hands of the trustee is conclusive of any other question, there is no need to discuss them.

By the last will and testament of Margaretha Bauernschmidt, she left to the Safe Deposit & Trust Company a certain part of her estate in trust for three grandchildren, one of whom is the defendant, and provided “* * * the net income is to be paid to each of my said grandchildren during his or her natural life respectively, and so that the same shall not be liable to be taken in execution or attachment or otherwise howsoever, and so that he or she shall be without power to pledge or anticipate the said income or any part thereof, in any manner whatsoever.” Frederick Bauernschmidt, by his will, left to the same trustee $300,000, of which one-sixth was to be held for the use and benefit of each of his six nephews and nieces, and provided “* * * that the income shall be paid directly into the hands of the respective beneficiaries therein named, and not into another, whether claiming under their authority or otherwise; and that the said trust estates and the income therefrom are not to be taken in execution or attachment or otherwise; and the said beneficiaries shall not pledge or anticipate said trust estates or the income thereof.” ³⁵⁴ Without any discussion of the meaning and effect of these trusts, to declare that they are spendthrift trusts, not subject to attachment, execution, assignment, or anticipation, it is only necessary to refer to Smith v. Towers, 69 Md. 77 , 14 A. 497 , 15 A. 92 ; Reid. v. Safe Dep. & Trust Co., 86 Md. 464 , 38 A. 899 ; Jackson Square Savings & Loan Assn. v. Bartlett, 95 Md. 661 , 53 A. 426 ; Safe Deposit & Trust Co. v. Independent Brewing Assn., 127 Md. 463 , 96 A. 617 ; and Johnson v. Stringer, 158 Md. 315 , 148 A. 447 . To overcome this obstacle in the decisions of this court with respect to attachments of incomes from spendthrift trusts, the plaintiff invokes the rule of comity between the states, and aims to apply here the rule in California that there is an exception in favor of decrees for alimony. The decree of the California court was in pursuance of an agreement between the plaintiff and defendant, so that it became, instead of alimony, an agreement for support which, if entered originally in this state, could not be enforced by attachment for contempt. Dickey v. Dickey, 154 Md. 675 , 141 A. 387 ; Bushman v. Bushman, 157 Md. 166 , 145 A. 448 .

In California, however, the failure of a husband to perform such a