Request By:
Hon. Robert E. Rice
Attorney At Law
801 Security Trust Building
Lexington, Kentucky 40507
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Richard O. Wyatt, Assistant Attorney General
RE: Construction of KRS 391.030(1)(c); (3); (4). KRS 392.020, KRS 392.080
Attorney General Steven L. Beshear has requested that I review and respond to your letter to this Office dated July 1, 1981, regarding estate and probate. Specifically, you asked whether the exempt property under KRS 391.030 should be charged against the one-half of the surplus personalty distributable under KRS 392.020 when the surviving spouse has renunciated the will under KRS 392.080.
Our opinion to your question is no.
KRS 391.030 (4) specifically allows the $3500 personalty exemption for a surviving spouse who has renounced a will under KRS 392.080. Were that $3500 to be considered as a set-off against the surplus under KRS 392.020, there would in fact have been no exemption. Under such circumstances, KRS 391.030 (3) and (4) would be meaningless.
Effect must be given to the clear and unambiguous acts of the legislature. As regards personalty in the circumstance described in your letter, the surviving spouse is entitled to $3500 before other distribution is made, which entitlement has priority over "payment of funeral expenses, charges of administration and debts." If after payment of the subject $3500, of the debts and expenses, there remains any personalty for further distribution, the surviving spouse is entitled to "an absolute estate in one-half" of any such surplus in accord with KRS 392.020.
We trust this information is helpful.