Wilkinson v. Leland , 7 L. Ed. 542 ( 1829 )

27 U.S. 627 (____) 2 Pet. 627

DAVID WILKINSON, PLAINTIFF IN ERROR
vs.
THOMAS LELAND AND OTHERS, DEFENDANTS IN ERROR.

Supreme Court of United States.

The case was argued by Mr Whipple, and Mr Wirt, for the plaintiff in error; and by Mr Webster, with whom was Mr Hubbard, for the defendants.

Mr Whipple, for the plaintiffs in error.

Mr Justice STORY delivered the opinion of the Court.

This is a writ of error to the circuit court of the district of Rhode Island, in a case where the plaintiff in error was defendant in the court below. The original action was an ejectment, in the nature of a real action, according to the local practice, to recover a parcel of land in North Providence in that state. There were several pleas pleaded of the statute of limitations, upon which it is unnecessary to say any thing, as the questions thereon have been waived at the bar. The cause was tried upon the general issue; and, by consent of the parties, a verdict was taken for the plaintiffs, and a bill of exceptions allowed upon a pro forma opinion given by the court in favour of the plaintiffs, to enable the parties to bring the case before this Court for a final determination. The only questions which have been discussed at the bar arise under this bill of exceptions.

The facts are somewhat complicated in their details, but those which are material to the points before us may be summed up in a few words.

The plaintiffs below are the heirs at law of Cynthia Jenckes, to whom her father, Jonathan Jenckes, by his will in 1787, devised the demanded premises in fee, subject to a life estate then in being, but which expired in 1794. By his will, Jonathan Jenckes appointed his wife Cynthia, and one Arthur Fenner, executrix and executor of his will. Fenner never accepted the appointment. At the time of his death Jonathan Jenckes lived in New Hampshire, and after his death his widow duly proved the will in the proper court of probate in that state, and took upon herself the administration of the estate as executrix. The estate was represented insolvent, and commissioners were appointed in the usual manner to ascertain the amount of the debts. The executrix, in July 1790, obtained a license from the judge of probate in New Hampshire, to sell so much of the real estate of the testator, as, together with his personal estate, would be sufficient to pay his debts and incidental charges. The will was never proved, or administration taken out in any probate court of Rhode Island. But the executrix, in November 1791, sold the demanded premises to one Moses Brown and Oziel Wilkinson, under whom the defendant here claims, by a deed, in which she recites her authority to sell as aforesaid, and purports to act as executrix in the sale. The purchasers, however, not being satisfied with her authority to make the sale, she entered into a covenant with them on the same day, by which she bound herself to procure an act of the legislature of Rhode Island, ratifying and confirming the title so granted; and, on failure thereof. to repay the purchase money, &c. &c. She accordingly made an application to the legislature of Rhode Island for this purpose, stating the facts in her petition, and thereupon an act was passed by the legislature, at June session 1792, granting the prayer of her petition and ratifying the title. The terms of this act we shall have occasion hereafter to consider. In February, 1792, she settled her administration account in the probate court in New Hampshire, and thereupon the balance of £15 7s. 7d. only remained in her hands for distribution.

Such are the material facts; and the questions discussed at the bar, ultimately resolve themselves into the consideration of the validity and effect of the act of 1792. If that act was constitutional, and its terms, when properly construed, amount to a legal confirmation of the sale and the proceedings thereon, then the plaintiff is entitled to judgment, and the judgment below was erroneous. If otherwise, then the judgment ought to be affirmed.

It is wholly unnecessary to go into an examination of the regularity of the proceedings of the probate court in New Hampshire, and of the order or license there granted to the executrix to sell the real estate of the testator. That cause could have no legal operation in Rhode Island. The legislative and judicial authority of New Hampshire were bounded by the territory of that state, and could not be rightfully exercised to pass estates lying in another state. The sale, therefore, made by the executrix to Moses Brown and Oziel Wilkinson, in virtue of the said license, was utterly void; and the deed given thereupon was; proprio vigore, inoperative to pass any title of the testator to any lands described therein. It was a mere nullity.

Upon the death of the testator, his lands in Rhode Island, if not devised, were cast by descent upon his heirs, according to the laws of that state. If devised, they would pass to his devisees according to the legal intendment of the words of the devise. But, by the laws of Rhode Island, the probate of a will in the proper probate court is understood to be an indispensable preliminary to establish the right of the devisee, and then his title relates back to the death of the testator. No probate of this will has ever been made in any court of probate in Rhode Island; but that objection is not now insisted on; and if it were, and the act of 1792 is to have any operation, it must be considered as dispensing with or superseding that ceremony.

The objections taken by the defendants to this act, are, in the first place, that it is void as an act of legislation, because it transcends the authority which the legislature of Rhode Island can rightfully exercise under its present form of government. And, in the next place, that it is void as an act of confirmation, because its terms are not such as to give validity to the sale and deed, so as to pass the title of the testator, even if it were otherwise constitutional.

The first objection deserves grave consideration from its general importance. To all that has been said at the bar upon the danger, inconvenience and mischiefs of retrospective legislation in general, and of acts of the character of the present in particular, this Court has listened with attention, and felt the full force of the reasoning. It is an exercise of power, which is of so summary a nature, so fraught with inconvenience, so liable to disturb the security of titles, and to spring by surprise upon the innocent and unwary, to their injury and sometimes to their ruin; that a legislature invested with the power, can scarcely be too cautious or too abstemious in the exertion of it.

We must decide this objection, however, not upon principles of public policy, but of power; and precisely as the state court of Rhode Island itself ought to decide it.

Rhode Island is the only state in the union which has not a written constitution of government, containing its fundamental laws and institutions. Until the revolution in 1776, it was governed by the charter granted by Charles II. in the fifteenth year of his reign. That charter has ever since continued in its general provisions to regulate the exercise and distribution of the powers of government. It has never been formally abrogated by the people; and, except so far as it has been modified to meet the exigences of the revolution, may be considered as now a fundamental law. By this charter the power to make laws is granted to the general assembly in the most ample manner, "so as such laws, &c. be not contrary and repugnant unto, but as near as may be agreeable to the laws, &c. of England, considering the nature and constitution of the place and people there." What is the true extent of the power thus granted, must be open to explanation, as well by usage, as by construction of the terms, in which it is given. In a government professing to regard the great rights of personal liberty and of property, and which is required to legislate in subordination to the general laws of England, it would not lightly be presumed that the great principles of Magna Charta were to be disregarded, or that the estates of its subjects were liable to be taken away without trial, without notice, and without offence. Even if such authority could be deemed to have been confided by the charter to the general assembly of Rhode Island, as an exercise of transcendental sovereignty before the revolution, it can scarcely be imagined that that great event could have left the people of that state subjected to its uncontrolled and arbitrary exercise. That government can scarcely be deemed to be free, where the rights of property are left solely dependent upon the will of a legislative body, without any restraint. The fundamental maxims of a free government seem to require, that the rights of personal liberty and private property should be held sacred. At least no court of justice in this country would be warranted in assuming, that the power to violate and disregard them; a power so repugnant to the common principles of justice and civil liberty lurked under any general grant of legislative authority, or ought to be implied from any general expressions of the will of the people. The people ought not to be presumed to part with rights so vital to their security and well being, without very strong and direct expressions of such an intention. In Terret vs. Taylor, 9 Cranch, 43, it was held by this Court, that a grant or title to lands once made by the legislature to any person or corporation is irrevocable, and cannot be re-assumed by any subsequent legislative act; and that a different doctrine is utterly inconsistent with the great and fundamental principle of a republican government, and with the right of the citizens to the free enjoyment of their property lawfully acquired. We know of no case, in which a legislative act to transfer the property of A. to B. without his consent, has ever been held a constitutional exercise of legislative power in any state in the union. On the contrary, it has been constantly resisted as inconsistent with just principles, by every judicial tribunal in which it has been attempted to be enforced. We are not prepared therefore to admit that the people of Rhode Island have ever delegated to their legislature the power to divest the vested rights of property, and transfer them without the assent of the parties. The counsel for the plaintiffs have themselves admitted that they cannot contend for any such doctrine.

The question then arises whether the act of 1792 involves any such exercise of power. It is admitted that the title of an heir by descent in the real estate of his ancestor, and of a devisee in an estate unconditionally devised to him, is, upon the death of the party under whom he claimed, immediately devolved upon him, and he acquires a vested estate. But this, though true in a general sense, still leaves his title encumbered with all the liens which have been created by the party in his life time, or by the law at his decease. It is not an unqualified, though it be a vested interest; and it confers no title, except to what remains after every such lien is discharged. In the present case, the devisee under the will of Jonathan Jenckes without doubt took a vested estate in fee in the lands in Rhode Island. But it was an estate, still subject to all the qualifications and liens which the laws of that state annexed to those lands. It is not sufficient to entitle the heirs of the devisee now to recover, to establish the fact that the estate so vested has been divested; but that it has been divested in a manner inconsistent with the principles of law.

By the laws of Rhode Island, as indeed by the laws of the other New England states, (for the same general system pervades them on this subject) the real estate of testators and intestates stands chargeable with the payment of their debts, upon a deficiency of assets of personal estate. The deficiency being once ascertained in the probate court, a license is granted by the proper judicial tribunal, upon the petition of the executor or administrator, to sell so much of the real estate as may be necessary to pay the debts and incidental charges. The manner in which the sale is made is prescribed by the general laws. In Massachusetts and Rhode Island, the license to sell is granted, as matter of course, without notice to the heirs or devisees; upon the mere production of proof from the probate court of the deficiency of personal assets. And the purchaser at the sale, upon receiving a deed from the executor or administrator, has a complete title, and is in immediately under the deceased, and may enter and recover the possession of the estate, notwithstanding any intermediate descents, sales, disseisins, or other transfers of title or seisin. If therefore the whole real estate be necessary for the payment of debts, and the whole is sold, the title of the heirs or devisees is, by the general operations of law, divested and superseded; and so, pro tanto, in case of a partial sale.

From this summary statement of the laws of Rhode Island, it is apparent, that the devisee under whom the present plaintiffs claim, took the land in controversy, subject to the lien for the debts of the testator. Her estate was a defeasible estate, liable to be divested upon a sale by the executrix, in the ordinary course of law, for the payment of such debts; and all that she could rightfully claim, would be the residue of the real estate after such debts were fully satisfied. In point of fact, as it appears from the evidence in the case, more debts were due in Rhode Island than the whole value for which all the estate there was sold; and there is nothing to impeach the fairness of the sale. The probate proceedings further show, that the estate was represented to be insolvent; and in fact, it approached very near to an actual insolvency. So that upon this posture of the case, if the executrix had proceeded to obtain a license to sell, and had sold the estate according to the general laws of Rhode Island, the devisee and her heirs would have been divested of their whole interest in the estate, in a manner entirely complete and unexceptionable. They have been divested of their formal title in another manner, in favour of creditors entitled to the estate; or rather, their formal title has been made subservient to the paramount title of the creditors. Some suggestions have been thrown out at the bar, intimating a doubt whether the statutes of Rhode Island, giving to its courts authority to sell lands, for payment of debts, extended to cases where the deceased was not, at the time of his death, an inhabitant of the state. It is believed that the practical construction of these statutes has been otherwise. But it is unnecessary to consider whether that practical construction be correct or not, inasmuch as the laws of Rhode Island, in all cases, make the real estate of persons deceased chargeable with their debts, whether inhabitants or not. If the authority to enforce such a charge by a sale be not confided to any subordinate court, it must, if at all, be exercised by the legislature itself. If it be so confided, it still remains to be shown, that the legislature is precluded from a concurrent exercise of power.

What then are the objections to the act of 1792? First, it is said that it divests vested rights of property. But it has been already shown that it divests no such rights, except in favour of existing liens, of paramount obligation; and that the estate was vested in the devisee, expressly subject to such rights. Then again, it is said to be an act of judicial authority, which the legislature was not competent to exercise at all; or if it could exercise it, it could be only after due notice to all the parties in interest, and a hearing and decree. We do not think that the act is to be considered as a judicial act; but as an exercise of legislation. It purports to be a legislative resolution, and not a decree. As to notice, if it were necessary, (and it certainly would be wise and convenient to give notice, where extraordinary, efforts of legislation are resorted to, which touch private rights,) it might well be presumed, after the lapse of more than thirty years, and the acquiescence of the parties for the same period, that such notice was actually given. But by the general laws of Rhode Island upon this subject, no notice is required to be, or is in practice, given to heirs or devisees, in cases of sales of this nature; and it would be strange, if the legislature might not do without notice the same act which it would delegate authority to another to do without notice. If the legislature had authorised a future sale by the executrix for the payment of debts, it is not easy to perceive any sound objection to it. There is nothing in the nature of the act which requires that it should be performed by a judicial tribunal, or that it should be performed by a delegate, instead of the legislature itself. It is remedial in its nature, to give effect to existing rights.

But it is said that this is a retrospective act, which gives validity to a void transaction. Admitting that it does so, still it does not follow that it may not be within the scope of the legislative authority, in a government like that of Rhode Island, if it does not divest the settled rights of property. A sale had already been made by the executrix under a void authority, but in entire good faith, (for it is not attempted to be impeached for fraud;) and the proceeds, constituting a fund for the payment of creditors, were ready to be distributed as soon as the sale was made effectual to pass the title. It is but common justice to presume that the legislature was satisfied that the sale was bona fide, and for the full value of the estate. No creditors have ever attempted to disturb it. The sale then was ratified by the legislature; not to destroy existing rights, but to effectuate them, and in a manner beneficial to the parties. We cannot say that this is an excess of legislative power; unless we are prepared to say, that in a state not having a written constitution, acts of legislation, having a retrospective operation, are void as to all persons not assenting thereto, even though they may be for beneficial purposes, and to enforce existing rights. We think that this cannot be assumed as a general principle, by courts of justice. The present case is not so strong in its circumstances as that of Calder vs. Bull, 3 Dall. Rep. 386, or Rice vs. Parkman, 16 Mass. Rep. 226; in both of which the resolves of the legislature were held to be constitutional.

Hitherto, the reasoning of the Court has proceeded upon the ground that the act of 1792 was in its terms sufficient to give complete validity to the sale and deed of the executrix, so as to pass the testator's title. It remains to consider, whether such is its predicament in point of law.

For the purpose of giving a construction to the words of the act, we have been referred to the doctrine of confirmation at the common law, in deeds between private persons. It is said that the act uses the appropriate words of a deed of confirmation, "ratify and confirm;" and that a confirmation at the common law will not make valid a void estate or act, but only one which is voidable. It is in our judgment wholly unnecessary to enter upon any examination of this doctrine of the common law, some of which is of great nicety and strictness; because the present is not an act between private persons having interests and rights to be operated upon by the terms of their deed. This is a legislative act, and is to be interpreted according to the intention of the legislature, apparent upon its face. Every technical rule, as to the construction or force of particular terms, must yield to the clear expression of the paramount will of the legislature. It cannot be doubted that an act of parliament may by terms of confirmation make valid a void thing, if such is its intent. The cases cited in Plowden, 399, in Comyn's Dig. Confirmation, D; and in 1 Roll. Abridg. 583, are directly in point. The only question then is, what is the intent of the legislature in the act of 1792? Is it merely to confirm a void act, so as to leave it void, that is to confirm it in its infirmity? or is it to give general validity and efficacy to the thing done? We think there is no reasonable doubt of its real object and intent. It was to confirm the sale made by the executrix, so as to pass the title of her testator to the purchasers. The prayer of the petition, as recited in the act, was, that the legislature would "ratify and confirm the sale aforesaid, which was made by a deed executed by the executrix, &c." The object was a ratification of the sale, and not a mere ratification of the formal execution of the deed. The language of the act is "on due consideration whereof it is enacted, &c. that the prayer of the said petitioner be granted, and that the deed be, and the same is hereby ratified and confirmed, so far as respects the conveyance of any right or interest in the estate mentioned in said deed, which belonged to the said Jonathan Jenckes at the time of his decease." It purports therefore to grant the prayer, which asks a confirmation of the sale, and confirms the deed, as a conveyance of the right and interest of the testator. It is not an act of confirmation by the owner of the estate; but an act of confirmation of the sale and conveyance, by the legislature in its sovereign capacity.

We are therefore all of opinion that the judgment of the circuit court ought to be reversed, and that the cause be remanded with directions to the court to award a venire facias de novo.