Slater v. Moyer

Citations

• 245 Pa. 60
• 91 A. 216
• 1914 Pa. LEXIS 831

Syllabus

<p>Ejectment — Wills—Executor—Life estate — Devise to charity— Interested witnesses — Void devise — Act of April 26,1855, P. L. 828.</p> <p>1. A will containing, among other provisions, a gift for religions or charitable uses, is not void under the Act of April 26, 1855, P. L. 328, if it is not attested as that act requires; it is only the religious or charitable bequest or devise that fails.</p> <p>2. A testator devised his entire estate to his executor in trust for the purpose of (1) paying his debts and funeral expenses; (2) paying to.each of his two children $5; (3) paying to his widow as long as she remained unmarried an annuity of $1,500, out of the net income of his estate; (4) erecting a church window as a memorial to his father and mother; (5) establishing with his unsold real estate and any accumulated income a certain charity upon the death or remarriage of his widow. The widow elected to take under the will, but the two children renounced the bequest given them and brought ejectment to recover possession of all the real estate of which the father had died seized, some portions of which were in the possession of his executor and others in that of tenants under leases from him or his executor, on the ground that his will establishing a charity, was not attested by two disinterested witnesses, that the will therefore failed and he died intestate, and that they were entitled as his heirs. Held, that a nonsuit was properly entered.</p> <p>3. In such a ease where an action of ejectment was brought against the executor during the lifetime of the widow, and the plaintiffs offered in evidence the will of their father, the court should have granted a nonsuit on the ground that they themselves had shown title or right of possession in the defendants.</p>