Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 10.djvu/55

 PDLLIAM V. PULLIAM. 43 �So that, if the construction placed by the learned counsel for defend- ants on these statutes and decisions warrants the position that, by accepting the execution of the will only in Tennessee, the executor had no authority to sue for or colleet the assets in a foreign country, and no duty imposed upon him to do so, it does not follow that the same rule will prevail here. But I do not think the decisions in Tennessee, properly eonsidered, maintain the position. Swancy v. Scott, 9 Humph. 326, determined that the residence of a debtor is the aitus of the debt, and the administrator of that sitm was the proper party to collect it, notwithstanding the evidence of the debt was a judgment in another state. It did not appear that there was any administration in the domicile of the judgment plaintiff, Kentucky ; and it was not decided what would have been the rights of such domiciliary administrator except that he could not have sued in Tennessee without taking out letters here. Tbis was so, because Tennessee had not authorized a foreign administrator to sue in her courts, and by statute had authorized and required a local adminis- tration in such cases. But it does not follow because an executor may not sue in a foreign jurisdiction, without taking out letters testa- mentary, he bas no duty imposed upon him to take out letters or do whatever the local law requires, to give effect to the title he bas acquired by the will. His designation in the will as the choice of the testator for that trust imposed upon this executor the duty of taking out letters in Tennessee, and it was this designation that gave him the right to take out letters. And the same designation evidently imposes the same duty as to property situated in Arkansas, not because he bas taken out letters in Tennessee, but because he bas assumed the trust of execution. The qualification in Tennessee is the manifestation of his acceptance of the trust imposed upon him to execute this will, unless he can accept part and decline part ; select such duties as are agreeable to him, like those of collecting the notes given to the widow, and paying the proceeds to his brother, as a creditor, and refuse such as are disagreeable to him, like those of subjecting the assets first to the payment of debts. �It is manifest that the testator did not contemplate such a disas- trous separation of these trusts, and that the will does not readily accommodate itself to such an arrangement. It is almost absolutely essential to the rights of this plaintiff that the same person should have the execution of the will everywhere; and no just man, when he came to consider whether he should accept this trust, would for a moment have hesitated to decline, if he supposed at the time that by ��� �