Taylor v. Hoyt

Citations

• 2 Monag. 206
• 15 A. 892
• 1888 Pa. LEXIS 811

Syllabus

<p>The orphans’ court has no jurisdiction to sell the land of one who has been absent for seven years, under the Act of April 18, 1858, where no notice was given, by publication or otherwise, to the absent owner ; and where the record of the proceedings showed that they were instituted on the estate of the deceased father of the absentee, some three years after his death, and the petition averred that the father left a daughter, the absentee, either legitimate or illegitimate, who had been absent and unheard from for more than seven years before his death; and the record of such proceedings in the orphans’ court is no defence to an action of ejectment by the owner who afterwards returns._</p> <p>It seems that the Act should be strictly construed, as the constitutionality of the Act can be sustained only on the legal presumption that one who has been absent and unheard of for seven years is dead, a presumption unwarranted in fact.</p>