The New York State Appellate Court ruled yesterday that a Jewish girl may marry a non-Jew and continue to receive an interest in her great-grandfather’s estate despite a provision in his will that none of his descendants who “marries a person not of the Jewish faith and not of Jewish blood” may receive a legacy left by him.
Reversing a Surrogate Court’s decision, the Appellate Court said that Miss Jean Tanburn, the great-granddaughter of the late Abraham S. Rosenthal, could continue to receive a $6,500 a year income from a $675,000 trust fund, and a $10,000 cash legacy despite the fact that she will marry Donald Morrison Kelley, Jr., a non-Jew.
The court’s ruling was based on the fact that Miss Tanburn did not inherit directly from Mr. Rosenthal but from her father, the late Stephen A. Tanburn. A minority opinion on the three-to-two decision noted that the interpretation of the majority was unprecedented.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
