(B) STATUTES OF THE STATES AND TERRITORIES

Page. California-Continued.

1928 Code, § 9769...... 280 1927 Stats., c. 19..

CASES ADJUDGED

IN THE

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

AT

OCTOBER TERM, 1929.

GONZALEZ v. ROMAN CATHOLIC ARCHBISHOP OF MANILA.

CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF THE PHILIPPINE

ISLANDS.

No. 6. Argued April 8, 9, 1929. Decided October 14, 1929.

1. A judgment of the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands in a case in which the amount in controversy exceeds $25,000, is reviewable by this Court on certiorari. P. 11.

2. The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Manila is a juristic person amenable to the jurisdiction of the Philippine courts for the enforcement of any legal right; and a right claimed under a will to be appointed to, and receive the income from, a chaplaincy founded by the will is a subject-matter within the jurisdiction of those courts. P. 15.

3. The facts that the chaplaincy is a collative one and that its property was transferred to the spiritual properties of the Archbishopric, subject to ecclesiastical jurisdiction and control, affect the terms of the trust but do not deprive civil courts of jurisdiction to adjudicate legal rights arising therefrom. P. 16.

4. In the absence of fraud, collusion, or arbitrariness, the decisions of the proper church tribunals on matters purely ecclesiastical, although affecting civil rights, are accepted in litigation before the secular courts as conclusive, because the parties in interest made them so by contract or otherwise. P. 16.

81325-30——1

1

Statement of the Case.

280 U.S.

5. Pursuant to the will of its foundress, a perpetual collative chaplaincy was established in 1820. Such a chaplaincy is subject to ecclesiastical control, and intervention by the proper spiritual authority to appoint and ordain the chaplain is essential. The ecclesiastical law also prescribes the qualifications of the chaplain. Heid, in accordance with the implied intention of the parties, that the Canon Law in force at the time of the presentation of an applicant for appointment, rather than that in force in 1820, governs his fitness, and he cannot complain of an amendment adopted at a time when he was incligible under either law and was enjoying no right of which the amendment deprived him. P. 17.

6. The intention of the foundress of a collative chaplaincy, so far as expressed, was that the income should be applied to the celebration of masses and to the living of the chaplain, who should preferably be the nearest male relative in the line of descent from herself, or her grandson, the first incumbent. Four others of her descendants successively held the chaplaincy, the last of whom renounced it and was still living. During the resulting vacancy, the masses were duly celebrated and the Archbishop applied the surplus income currently to pious educational uses, supporting this by a custom of the archdiocese and provisions of Canon Law. Held, without deciding whether such disposition of the surplus was proper or what should be its disposition in the future, that a son of the last incumbent, who was properly refused appointment as chaplain because he had not the qualifications prescribed by the Canon Law, was not entitled, as the nearest relative, to the accrued surplus. P. 18.

7. Suit was brought by an individual to enforce his claimed right as sole beneficiary under a will to the appointment to, and accrued surplus income from, a collative chaplaincy. Held, that, on appeal, the action cannot be treated as a suit by him as representative of the heirs of the testatrix as a class to recover the surplus income during a vacancy. P. 19.

Affirmed.

CERTIORARI, 278 U. S. 588, to review a judgment of the Supreme Court of the Philippine. Islands, which reversed a judgment recovered by Gonzalez directing the Archbishop of Manila to appoint him to a chaplaincy and to pay to him the income thereof accrued during its vacancy.

1

Argument for Petitioner.

Mr. Howard Thayer Kingsbury, with whom Messrs. Frederic R. Coudert and Allison D. Gibbs were on the brief, for petitioner.

The decision below defeats the testamentary intentions of the foundress.

The registration should have been in the name of the "Capellania" itself as a juristic person. See Capellania de Tombobong v. Antonio, 8 Phil. Rep. 683; Capellania de Tombobong v. Cruz, 9 id. 145.

At no stage of the cause has the lawful character of the Foundation, under the applicable local law, been questioned. It was assumed, as obviously not subject to controversy, in Gonzalez v. Harty, 32 Phil. Rep. 328. See Manila v. Archbishop, 36 id. 145.

The same practice was there followed on this subject in the Philippines as prevails under English Ecclesiastical Law, namely, that the income of a benefice during a vacancy goes to the next incumbent. See Burn, Ecclesiastical Law, Vol. 4, p. 1, et seq.

The Canon (§ 1481) providing for a different disposition of the income of a vacant benefice appears to be an innovation of 1918, and it would, moreover, be inappropriate to apply it to a "Capellania colativa familiar," limited to a particular family, such as this.

The inviolability of lawful testamentary intentions has been repeatedly declared and sustained by this Court. Gray v. Noholoa, 214 U. S. 108; Kenaday v. Sinnott, 179 U. S. 606. Spanish law recognized the same rule as applicable to the testamentary foundation of a Chaplaincy.

The decision below permits the Canon of 1918 to be applied retroactively to defeat and divest property rights and allows the ecclesiastical authorities to be both legislators and judges in their own cause.