Purington v. McPherson

THE COURT.

This appeal involves the validity of a certain bequest made to the Regents of the University of California.

The facts are simple and without conflict. Henrietta Elizabeth Purington died in San Francisco on February 3, 1924, possessed of an estate of the appraised value of $70,-912. She left a last will and testament dated November 13, 1923. After making minor bequests to five of her personal friends she bequeathed a legacy of $7,000 to the endowment fund of Grace Cathedral Corporation. The remainder of the estate was disposed of by her under a residuary clause in her will. The sum of $5,000 was devised to the Regents of the University of California for the maintenance of the laboratory of the Homeopathic Research Foundation, and the remainder of the fund was given to the Regents in trust as a scholarship to be known as the Irene Purington Fund. It was stipulated at the trial that the Grace Cathedral Corporation is a charitable institution. It is claimed, therefore, that the amount bequeathed to charity by the testator is approximately $58,712, which sum is $38,408 in excess of one-third of the net value of the estate exclusive of the absolute specific bequest to the University of the sum of $5,000 for research work which is admitted to be valid, a matter hereinafter referred to.

Upon petition for partial distribution it was contended by appellants, who are heirs at law of said deceased by virtue of their relationship to her deceased husband, that the bequest to the University of the fund for scholarship purposes was a bequest in trust for charitable uses, and hence invalid to the extent that it, together with the specific bequest

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to Grace Cathedral Corporation, exceeds one-third of the total value of the estate. After hearing, the trial judge held that the bequest in question was a bequest to the University and therefore not within the inhibition of section 1313 of the Civil Code, and appellants’ petition for partial distribution was accordingly denied. The sole question here presented is the validity

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of such bequest. The history of the legislation controlling this subject shows that, up to the year 1917, section 1313 of the Civil Code provided in substance, among other things, that a bequest or devise to a charitable or benevolent corporation, or to any corporation, or person in trust for a charitable use was invalid to the extent that such bequest exceeded one-third of the total value of the estate of the decedent. In the year 1917, the section was amended by adding at the end thereof the following : “And provided further that bequests and devises to the state or to any state institution or for the use or benefit of the state or any state institution, are excepted from the restrictions of this section'.” (Stats. 1917, p. 272.) In the year 1919 (Stats. 1919, p. 324), the section was recast so as to include the above proviso. The section was again amended in 1925 by exempting from its restrictions all bequests and devises “to any municipality, county or political subdivision within the State.”