Erhardt v. Baltimore Monthly Meeting of Friends, Park Ave.

Briscoe, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The appeal in this case is taken from a decree of the Circuit Court of Baltimore City passed on the 18th day of March, 1901. The object of the proceedings was to obtain a construction of the last will and testament of John Jewett, late of Baltimore City, deceased, and for an administration of his estate in a Court of equity. Mr. Jewett, the testator, died on the 3rd day of April, 1900, leaving a large and valuable estate of real and personal property and his will, dated October 31st, 1899, was duly probated and recorded in the Office of the Register of Wills of Baltitimore City.

The testator died unrnarried and without children, but leaving as surviving heirs, a brother and certain nephews and nieces. By his will he devised and bequeathed all of his property and effects of every kind, real and personal in the following manner, except the sum of twelve thousand dollars which he disposed of by specific legacies to his relatives : “ I give and bequeath to Townsend Scott, hereinafter named as my executor, twenty-five shares of Consolidated Gas Company’s Stock, in trust, to pay the income or dividends thereof to Maria Waugh so long as she may live, and upon her decease to apply the principal towards the residue of my estate. “I give,- devise and bequeath all the residue of my estate, real, personal and mixed, of whatsoever kind and wheresoever situated to the Baltimore Monthly Meeting of Friends, Park Avenue, a body corporate, under the general corporation laws of the State of Maryland, in trust for the following purpose, that is to to say : ⁶⁷⁸ . “The trustees of said corporation and their successors to invest said residue or to hold the same in such manner as to them shall seem best for the object intended, and to apply the income thereof for the use of the school known as the Park Avenue Friends’ Elementary and High School, or by whatsoever name the said school may hereafter be called, said school being under the charge and control of the said Baltimore Monthly Meeting of Friends, Park Avenue, and now held and conducted in a building lately érected on ground belonging to said corporation; and adjoining that of their meeting house :on Park Avenue, Baltimore.” , These are the principal clauses of the will which are involved in this controversy and the validity of which, are attacked by this proceeding. The grounds relied upon by the -appellants arid those alleged in' the bill to establish the invalidity of the residuary clauses of the will are, first, Because the provisions which dispose of the remainder, after the life-estate, and the residuary devises and bequests are void and invalid because they constitute an attempt to create a trust in perpetuity ; second, because the trust attempted to be created is for the use and benefit of an unincorporated institution, to wit, the Park Avenue Friends Elementary and High School; third, because the objects and purposes for which the trust was attempted to be created are too vague and indefinite to be enforced ; and fourth, because the trustee is without legal capacity to take and execute the trust. The executor and the Baltimore Monthly Meeting of Friends, Park Avenue, answered the bill alleging the validity of the will, and after a hearing, upon testimony taken, a decree was passed sustaining 'the residuary clauses of the will as a valid devise and bequest and decreeing “that the Baltimore Monthly'Meeting of Friends, Park Avenue, was entitled to receive the rest and residue of the estate to be held by it for the purposes set forth therein.” From this decree this appeal has been taken.

The main object in the construction of wills is to ascertain the inteiition of the testator and according to the settled canons pf construction, to give and to carry into effect that intention, ⁶⁷⁹ if it can be done. It is very manifest, if the appellant’s contention in this case is sustained, that one of the principal- objects of the testator’s bounty will be defeated and the bulk of his’ estate will pass to those whom he clearly did not intend should have it. The substantial question in the case is whether the devise and bequest to the Baltimore Monthly Meeting of Friends, Park Avenue, is a valid devise and bequest. There can be no serious dispute or controversy as to the law controlling the décision of a question of this character in this State, at this date.

In the case of the Trustees of the Eutaw Place Baptist Church v. Shively, 67 Md. 493 , where a testator bequeathed one thousand dollars to a church, the income, interest or proceeds thereof to be applied to the Sunday-school belonging to ©r attached to the church, the latter being a corporate body, but the Sunday school was not, this Court held that as the Sunday school was shown to be an integral part of the church organization arid therefore embraced within the scope of the corporate functions and work of the church, the bequest was sufficiently .definite and certain ^and capable of being enforced. In Halsey et als. v. The Convention of the Prot. Episcopal Church, 75 Md. 280 , where a testatrix devised a farm to her nephew for life, and upon his death'one'hundred acres of the farm was devised to the Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church of. the Diocese of Marylarid, a body corporate, to be held as a place for a Church School for boys ; to be under the control and supervision of the church ; and where she also bequeathed a fund of $20,000.00, the income of which was to be paid to her sister for life, and then $5,000 of the fund should at her sister’s death’be paid to the Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church as an endowment for War-field College, this Court said : “It is well settled that a’Court of charicery has jurisdiction independent altogether of the statute to enforce a trust for charitable and religious purposes, provided the devise or bequest be made to a person or body corporate capable of taking and holding the property so devised and bequeathed, and provided, further, the object and ⁶⁸⁰ character of the trust be definite and certain. When these exist—when the gift is made to one capable of taking it, and when the trust is declared in definite terms—a Court of chancery has the same power to enforce such a trust for a charitable or religious purpose, as it has to enforce a trust for any other purpose.” In Hanson et al. v. Little Sisters of the Poor, 79 Md. 435 , a testator devised certain warehouse property to a trustee, in trust, to hold the same and collect the rents and income, and after paying all taxes, to divide the net income thereof equally between the Little Sisters of the Poor, the Vestry of Saint Mary’s Church, Baltimore County, and other corporations.

This devise was sustained, and the objections to its validity were overruled. In Bennett v. Humane Impartial Society, 91 Md. 10 , a testator devised the residue of his estate to the Aged Men’s Home and Women’s Home, provided the managers of the homes admit one aged man or woman, and it was held that the will did not create a trust, and the devise was not void. The Chief Judge of this Court in delivering the opinion, said: “A trust may be created either by the use of appropriate technical words which, of their own proper vigor, indicate that a trust was designed to be raised; or, in the absence of such words, a trust may be created by other language when the purpose to establish it is otherwise sufficiently apparent. In both m-stances, however, it always becomes a question of intention as to whether a trust exists.

If there be a manifest design to establish a trust then a trust will be declared though no apt technical words are employed ; and if there be an equally manifest design not to establish a trust, then no trust will be declared though the words employed would, but for the contrary intention, be sufficient to create a trust. ” Arid in the recent case of Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of Methodist Episcopal Church v. Mitchell, ante p. 199, decided on March 8th, 1901, a will was sustained where a clause in the will bequeathed the testatrix residuary estate to the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church ⁶⁸¹ to be held in trust, by that Society for the education of six girls in India, &c., the remainder to be used for the education of Christian girls and to be named after the testatrix. The Court said: “Now, perhaps, had the precise phraseology which is found in the will before us been used in making a like devise and bequest to a natural person, it might be said that the design was to create a trust, because the purposes indicated are not those ordinarily peformed by an individual; but when it is remembered that the very end which the corporation here made the beneficiary was organized to effect is the education of Bible readers and the instruction of girls in foreign lands, it becomes evident that the property was given to the corporation not in trust for indefinite objects, but that it was given to it to be used for its recognized and clearly defined corporate purposes. The specific design of the gift is that the proceeds of the property shall be used (that is, spent) by the beneficiary for its chartered ends, and not for some one else’s benefit. The corporation is not to hold the fund for the use of the others, but it is to spend that fund in