Swift v. Harbison-Walker Refractories Co.

Citations

• 228 Pa. 584
• 77 A. 916
• 1910 Pa. LEXIS 530

Syllabus

<p>Deeds — Habendum clause — Life estate — Contingent remainders — Sale under Price,: act — Petition—Jurisdiction.</p> <p>1. Under a deed which purports to vest a fee simple title in the grantee, but for a proviso in the habendum clause that in case grantee shall survive her husband the estate shall immediately vest in her children, and in case of no issue then her estate to be limited to a life estate with remainder after her death in the heirs at law of her husband, any interest the children may acquire under this deed is contingent during the lifetime of the husband and wife.</p> <p>2. A petition presented to the common pleas under the Price act averring the execution and recording of such a deed to the mother, quoting the habendum, including the proviso of that deed, and setting forth that the purchase money of the sale, subject to the life estate of their mother, is to belong to the'children then bom and those that may thereafter be born, and that the deed is to convey, a fee to the grantee, contains sufficient jurisdictional facts to authorize the court to decree a sale of the interests of the children.</p> <p>Sale — Real estate — Price act — Lapse of time — Presumption as to compliance with statutory provisions.</p> <p>3. A court taking jurisdiction under the Price act which imposes on it certain duties of investigation before making the decree of sale, will be assumed, after the expiration of more than a quarter of a century, in the absence of anything to the contrary being disclosed, to have performed those duties and to have required the petitioners to comply with the provisions of the statute before entering the decree.</p>