About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

Kosciuszko Armstrong, Appellant v. Benjamin L. Lear, Administrator of Thaddeus Kosciuszko and others 52 (1834)

handle is hein.slavery/ussccases0118 and id is 1 raw text is: SUPREME COURT. KOSCIUSZKO ARMSTRONG, APPELLANT V. BENJAMIN L. LEAR, ADMINISTRATOR OF THADDEUS KOSCLUSZKO AND OTHERS. A bill was filed in the circuit court of the district of Columbia, claiming a legacy under an alleged codicil made in Paris, to a will made in tile United States. The testator was a native of Poland : at the time of the making of the codicil he resided in France; and when he made the will, to which the instrument, upon which the legacy was claimed was said to be a codicil, he was in the United States. He went to Europe soon after he made the will, and many years afterwards he died in Switzerland. The bill alleged that the instrument on which the legacy was claimed had been duly proved in the orphan's court of Washington county, in the district of Columbia, where the adminigtrator, with the will annexed, resided. There was no allegation that the codicil had been established to be a valid will by the law of France, the place of the domicil of the testator where the same was made. The administrator submitted to the court whether it would decree the payment of the money to the complainant t upon an instrument made under the.cir- cumnstances, and authenticated in the manner that the aforesaid instrument is, and whether the said instrument shall have .effect to revoke or alter any part of said testator's will, solemnly executed and left in the hands'of his executor in this country, &c. &c. By the court: This is certainly a very informal anl loose mode of putting in issue (if upon the bill such -a question can be tried) the validity of a will made in a foreign country, whose laws arb not brought before the court, either by averment or evidence. The answer contains an allegation, that certain persons residing in Europe have filed a bill in the circuit court of the district of Columbia, against him, the administrator, claiming a large portion of the assets, if not tile whole, as creditors or mortgagees of the testator; and certain persons, also residing in Europe, have filed another bill against him (it was probably meant in the same court), claiming the whole assets, as heirs at law of the testator, and therefore as distributees of the said assets. None of the parties to either of these latter bills are made parties to the present bill. By the court: The persons claiming as heirs of the testator, should be made parties, that they may have an opportunity to contest the plaintiff's title, as the real parties in interest, the administrator being but a mere stake holder. The heirs and legal representatives of the testator filed a bill in the circuit court claiming from the administrator of the testator with the will annexed, the funds which had come into his hands ; which bill is still pending. The allegations in the bill go to defeat the validity of the will made in the United States, and also assert other grounds of claim.- By the court: All the bills ought, if possible, to be brought to a hearing at the same time in the circuit court, in order that a final disposition mAy, at the same time, be made of all the questions arising in all of them. If the intention is to put in issue (as it seems to be), not only the construction and operation of the testamentary instrument in favour of the plaintiff, but its validity and effedt as a will, it is material that the law of France, the

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most