Vance v. Upson

Citations

• 64 Tex. 266

Syllabus

<p>1. Probate — Appeal to district court — Revocation. — A will was probated in March, 1881; in January, 1882, proceedings were had in the same court to probate a subsequent will; the case was appealed to the district court, and an amended petition was filed, praying that the first will be declared a revoked and canceled will, and that the executors under the first will be required to account with and turn over the property to the executors named in the second will. Held:</p> <p>(1) That on appeal the district court could do in the case whatever the county court could have done. There could be no doubt of the jurisdiction of the district court to admit to probate the paper claimed to be the last will of the deceased, if the evidence showed that such was its true character, and that it was properly executed.</p> <p>(2) The fact that the county court bad formerly admitted to probate, as the will of the same testator, another paper executed as a will, prior in point of time to the last, interposes no obstacle whatever to the probate of any paper or papers which may be in fact and in law the last will of the testator.</p> <p>(3) There is no doubt that a probate court can correct errors arising out of fraud or mistake in its own decrees. This power does not render the decrees of such a court less conclusive in any other court, or in any way impair the probate jurisdiction, but renders that jurisdiction more complete and effectual, and, by enabling the probate court to correct mistakes and supply defects in its own decrees, better entitles them to be deemed conclusive in other courts. Following Waters v. Stickney, 12 Allen, 1; Gaines v. Hennen, 24 How., 567.</p> <p>(4) That the proposition that the paper claimed to be the last will could not be probated so long as the probate of the earlier will was not revoked is unsound in principle and not sustained by authority. The validity of the paper last executed could be determined only through the judgment of a court, having ju