Public-domain · open source
OpenJurist

67 Ala. 40

Lott v. Graves

Supreme Court of Alabama

Decided December 15, 1880

Supreme Court of Alabama · decided 1880-12-15

Petition by Administrator to Sell Lands to Pay Debts, Appeal from the Probate Court of Mobile county. Heard before Hon. Price Williams. Appellee Graves filed his petition in the Probate Court of Mobile, praying for letters of administration on the estate of Clara E. Lott, who was the wife of the appellant Lott.

Cited by 2 later decisions — most recently March 2004

2 state decisions

Relies on Smyley v. Reese · Gunn v. Samuel's Adm'r · Timberlake v. Brewer

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1880-12-15

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

STONE, J.

¶1— The law casts on the surviving husband the duty and legal obligation of burying his deceased wife, and of paying for the proper funeral expenses. No one, except the wife by her own contract, can fasten a charge on ber equitable separate estate. It follows that neither the surviving husband, nor any one else, after the death of tbe owner of such estate, can incur any debt, for which the estate can be made liable.— Gunn v. Samuel, 33 Ala. 201; Smyley v. Reese, 53 Ala. 89. Tbe expense of burying Mrs. Lott -was in no sense a debt due from her estate, and could not constitute the owner of such claim a creditor of ber estate. Graves, not being a creditor of hers, had no claim or right, on that account, to the administration of ber estate, and the claim was not a debt, to justify tbe sale of her property for its payment. — Owens v. Childs, 59 Ala. 113; Garrett v. Bruner.

¶2Reversed and remanded.

/67/ala/40 · .json · Public domain