court decision that testator intended, by use of terms “children,” "grandchildren,” “issue,” and "lineal descendants,” to exclude adopted children from testamentary trust was res judicata, barring relitigation of claim despite subsequent decisions enlarging rights of adopted children
How later courts described this case
- court decision that testator intended, by use of terms “children,” "grandchildren,” “issue,” and "lineal descendants,” to exclude adopted children from testamentary trust was res judicata, barring relitigation of claim despite subsequent decisions enlarging rights of adopted children
- once judgment is final it cannot be collaterally attacked even if mistakes were made in the original proceeding
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
ROBERTS, Justice
(dissenting).
*107 I
In Tafel Estate, 449 Pa. 442 , 296 A.2d 797 (1972), this Court adopted “ ‘a rule of construction which, in the absence of a clear expression in the instrument of the settlor’s intention to the contrary, would deem adoptees as embraced within such general designations as “issue” or “children”.’ ” Id. at 452 , 296 A.2d at 802 (emphasis omitted), quoting Fownes Trust, 421 Pa. 476, 484 , 220 A.2d 8, 12 (1966) (dissenting opinion). Yet today the plurality concludes from the use of “children,” “grandchildren,” “issue,” and “lineal descendants” that Tower’s will “clearly illustrates that the bounty of the trust was to be confined to bloodlines only.” Ante at 676. This conclusion is nothing but reliance “ ‘on such cryptic and unrevealing terms as “issue” and “children,” ’ ” which we foreswore in Tafel. 449 Pa. at 451 , 296 A.2d at 802 . I have no doubt that Mr. Tower “ ‘failed to advert to the possibility of adopted children, their inclusion or exclusion, and, accordingly, expressed no explicit direction one way or the other.’ ” Id. I must conclude that Tower’s will does not contain “any expressed intention . to the contrary,” (id. at 453, 296 A.2d at 803 ) and, therefore, if the will were before the Court for the first time today, it would be presumed to include appellants as children of Tower’s grandchild. Tower Estate, 410 Pa. 389, 394 , 189 A.2d 870, 873 (1963) (dissenting opinion); see Tafel Estate, supra; Chase Manhattan Bank v. Mitchell, 53 N.J. 415 , 251 A.2d 128 (1969); Estate of Coe, 42 N.J. 485 , 201 A.2d 571 (1964); Estate of Park, 15 N.Y.2d 413 , 260 N.Y.S.2d 169 , 207 N.E.2d 859 (1965).
II
However, Tower’s will is not before the Court for the first time today. The opinion announcing the judgment attaches significance to that fact which, in my view, is unwarranted. It has long been the law that successive *108 accountings in the administration of estates and trusts are considered separate proceedings in which legal determinations made in an earlier proceeding are not binding in a later proceeding.
“ ‘ [T] he rule of estoppel does not extend the law which was applied in . [an] earlier distribution to . . . [a subsequent] distribution. Though the decree in the first may have rested on a mistaken application of a rule of law, a circumstance which can only be inquired into on appeal, so long as the decree stands it is conclusive with respect to all rights in the fund distributed; but it cannot be made the basis of an estoppel when another distinct fund is to be distributed though it be part of the same estate.”
Arrott Estate, 421 Pa. 275, 281 , 217 A.2d 741, 745 (1966), quoting Kellerman Estate, 242 Pa. 3, 12 , 88 A. 865, 868-69 (1913). Accord, Brown Estate, 408 Pa. 214, 229-31 , 183 A.2d 307, 314-15 (1962); Reamer Estate, 331 Pa. 117, 120-24 , 200 A. 35, 37-38 (1938); cf. Catherwood Trust, 405 Pa. 61 , 173 A.2d 86 (1961).
It is clear to me that Tower I was “a mistaken application of a rule of law.” Therefore, it does not foreclose the Court from applying the law as correctly expressed in Tafel to distributions encompassed in the present and future accountings, for “ ‘[w]hile errors committed with regard to one fund may be irremediable as to it, they do not impose upon the court the necessity of persisting in the same errors in the disposition of a subsequent fund.’ ” Arrott Estate, supra, 421 Pa. at 281 , 217 A.2d at 745 , quoting Reamer Estate, supra, at 121, 200 A. at 37 .
Thus, there is no reason for the Court in this partial account * to persist in the erroneous determination made *109 in Tower I. On the contrary, it is the duty of this Court and of the orphans’ court to require that distribution “be controlled by the law in effect at the time of the audit.” Arrott Estate, supra, 421 Pa. at 281 , 217 A.2d at 745 , I would vacate the decree of the orphans’ court and remand the case to that court for the entry of a decree based on the application of Tafel to Tower’s will. Therefore, I dissent.
MANDERINO, J., joins in this dissent.
What we said of the appeal in Arrott Estate, supra, 421 Pa. at 282 n. 7, 217 A.2d at 745 n. 7, is equally applicable in this case: “The instant appeal . . ., involving a distinct and separate fund from that involved in the prior appeal, and arising out of a subsequent accounting, is not the same case as that involved in the prior proceedings before this Court.”