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235 N.C. 634

70 S.E.2d 664

Farthing v. Farthing

Supreme Court of North Carolina

Decided May 21, 1952

Supreme Court of North Carolina · decided 1952-05-21

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“The Declaratory Judgment Act ... is designed to provide an expeditious method of procuring a judicial decree construing wills, contracts and other written instruments and declaring the rights and liabilities of parties thereunder. It is not a vehicle for the nullification of such instruments. Nor is it a substitute or alternate method of contesting the validity of wills.”

quoted by 3 later decisions, including Yount v. Yount, 68 N.C. App. 554 - Town of Nags Head v. Tillett

Relies on Brissie v. Craig · In re Will of Puett · In Re Will of Puett

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1952-05-21

How this case has been cited

Cited by 33 later decisions — most recently February 2022 · most notably 134 N.C. App. 626 - Bueltel v. Lumber Mutual Insurance (1999), 131 N.C. App. 655 - Terrell v. Lawyers Mutual Liability Insurance (1998)

31 state decisions

9019521960197019801990200020102020decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

BaeNhill, J.

¶1 The court below was without original jurisdiction to entertain this action to nullify any part of the duly probated will which is the subject matter of this action. Hence the judgment entered must be vacated on authority of In re Will of Puett, 229 N.C. 8, 47 S.E. 2d 488; Brissie v. Craig, 232 N.C. 701, 62 S.E. 2d 330; Anderson v. Atkinson, 234 N.C. 271; Anderson v. Atkinson, ante, 300.

¶2 The Declaratory Judgment Act, G.S. Ch. 1, Art. 26, is designed to provide an expeditious method of procuring a judicial decree construing wills, contracts, and other written instruments and declaring the rights and liabilities of parties thereunder. It is not a vehicle for the nullification of such instruments. Nor is it a substitute or alternate method of contesting the validity of wills.

¶3 It does not follow, however, that the demurrer entered in this Court must be sustained. Plaintiffs’ action does not fall in toto for want of jurisdiction of the trial court. In article IV plaintiff J. Watts Earthing is devised the beach property and the farm in fee simple. In article IX he is devised the same property subject to certain conditions and provisions which limit the estate devised. Do these provisions limit the estate *636 conveyed both as to the beach property and the farm or only as to the farm? The language used is sufficiently ambiguous to require judicial construction and the petition is sufficient to entitle plaintiffs to a judicial decree definitely determining the nature and extent of his title to each parcel of property so devised to him.

¶4 To the end that the judgment entered may be vacated and the parties may be heard on the question properly presented by the pleadings, the cause is remanded.

¶5 Error and remanded.

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