Cowan v. Stamps

Citations

• 46 Miss. 435

Syllabus

<p>1. Will — capacity oe negroes to take under it — case under consideration and conclusions. — 0. made Ms will in 1850, by which he directed that all his slaves he sent to Africa, there to become free; and that, for this purpose, his executors should talle charge of the slaves and hire them out until a sufficiency was realized to pay their expenses to Africa and support them there for six months; and that his executors should immediately collect all debts due to him, sell all his property, real and personal, and, after paying debts and. expenses, convert the surplus into funds suitable to be remitted to Africa, for the use and benefit of the negroes in Africa, to be equally divided among them, and died in 1864, at his residence, eight miles from the federal lines, and fifteen or twenty from the Confederate lines, in a section of country between the armies of the two belligerents, frequented by scouts from both, but more frequently by those from the United States, and afterward receded from by the Confederate forces and lelt to federal control: SeM, 1. That the rights of parties were fixed by the condition of things existing at the death of the testator, and the question of the validity or invalidity of the will is determinable by consideration of the public policy of the United States, rather than by that which had formerly prevailed in favor of slavery in the locality of the testator; and therefore that the will is valid; 2d. That the negroes were capable of taking under the will; and, 3d. As the provisions of the will were executory and its beneficiaries are now free from any disability to take, it should be executed in their favor.</p> <p>2. Same — execution oe the tbtjst ebeed ebom the conditions imposed by the wide. —Though the will contemplated a sale of the property and removal of its beneficiaries to Africa, they are now entitled to have it without a sale or their removal.</p>