|
In the common law of England, the doctrine of worthier title was a legal doctrine that preferred taking title to real estate by descent over taking title by devise or by purchase. The rule provided that where a testator undertook to convey an heir the same estate in land that the heir would take under the laws of inheritance, the heir would be adjudged to have taken title to the land by inheritance rather than by the conveyance, because descent through the bloodline was held to be "worthier" than a conveyance through a legal instrument. It essentialy provides that a vested remainder cannot be created in the grantor's heirs. This article concerns the common-law legal system, as contrasted with the civil law legal system; for other meanings of the term, within the field of law, see common law (disambiguation). ...
Royal motto: Dieu et mon droit (French: God and my right) Englands location within the UK Official language English de facto Capital London de facto Largest city London Area - Total Ranked 1st UK 130,395 km² Population - Total (2001) - Density Ranked 1st UK 49,138,831 377/km² Ethnicity...
Title is a legal term for an owners interest in a piece of property. ...
Real estate is a legal term that encompasses land along with anything permanently affixed to the land, such as buildings. ...
For other uses, see inheritance (disambiguation). ...
In the law, a will or testament is a documentary instrument by which a person (the testator) regulates the rights of others over the testators property or family after their death. ...
To gain control of an asset in exchange for a valuable consideration. ...
In law vesting is to give an immediately secured right of present or future enjoyment. ...
In mathematics, the result of the division of two integers usually cannot be expressed with an integer quotient, unless a remainder —an amount left over— is also acknowledged. ...
For other uses, see inheritance (disambiguation). ...
Image File history File links Legal portal image File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ...
Property law is the law that governs the various forms of ownership in real property (land as distinct from personal or moveable possessions) and in personal property, within the common law legal system. ...
This article concerns the common-law legal system, as contrasted with the civil law legal system; for other meanings of the term, within the field of law, see common law (disambiguation). ...
A gift, in the law of property, has a very specific meaning. ...
In real estate law, adverse possession is a means of acquiring title to anothers real property without compensation. ...
A deed is a legal instrument used to grant a privilege. ...
In the common law of property, personal belongings that have left the possession of their rightful owners without having directly entered the possession of another person are deemed to be lost, mislaid, or abandoned, depending on the circumstances under which they were found by the next party to come into...
Bailment describes a legal relationship where physical possession of personal property (chattels) is transferred from one person (the bailor) to another person (the bailee) who subsequently holds possession of the property. ...
A license or licence is a document or agreement giving permission to do something. ...
Fee simple, also known as fee simple absolute or allodial, is a term of art in common law. ...
A life estate, at common law is an estate in real property that ends at death. ...
Fee tail is an obsolescent term of art in common law. ...
A concurrent estate or co-tenancy is a concept in property law, particularly derived from the common law of real property, which describes the various ways in which property can be owned by more than one person at a given time. ...
A leasehold estate is an ownership interest in land in which a lessee or a tenant holds real property by some form of title from a lessor or landlord. ...
A future interest is one of a variety of potential claims to ownership of property, in particular real estate. ...
The rule against perpetuities is a rule in property law which prohibits a contingent grant or will from vesting outside a certain period of time. ...
The Rule in Shelleys Case, dating from the 14th century, is a famous if now almost useless legal rule that is now the bane of most first-year law students studying common law real property law. ...
A nonpossessory interest in land is a term of the law of property to describe any of a category of rights held by one person to use land that is in the possession of another. ...
An easement is the right of use over the real property of another. ...
A profit, in the law of real estate, is a nonpossessory interest in land similar to the better-known easement, which gives the holder the right to take natural resources such as petroleum, minerals, timber, and wild game from the land of another. ...
A covenant running with the land, in the law of real property, is a nonpossessory interest in land in the form of an agreement between adjoining landowners to do or not do something with relation to the land that they respectively occupy - to maintain a fence, for example, or not...
An equitable servitude is a term used in the law of real property to describe a nonpossessory interest in land that operates much like a covenant running with the land, requiring the landowner to maintain certain practices with respect to the land (e. ...
In the law of real property, fixtures are anything that would otherwise be a chattel that have, by reason of incorporation or affixation, become permanently attached to the real property. ...
Waste is a term used in the law of real property to describe a cause of action that can be brought in court to address a change in condition of real property brought about by a current tenant that damages or destroys the value of that property. ...
History of the doctrine
The doctrine of worthier title, like the Rule in Shelley's Case, had its origin in attempts by royal courts to avoid various devices contrived by lawyers during the era of feudalism to retain lands in their families while avoiding feudal duties, and to secure its free alienability. Such, at least, is the explanation given in Coke on Littleton: The Rule in Shelleys Case, dating from the 14th century, is a famous if now almost useless legal rule that is now the bane of most first-year law students studying common law real property law. ...
Defining feudalism is difficult because there is no generally accepted agreement on what it means. ...
Sir Edward Coke Sir Edward Coke (pronounced cook) (1 February 1552 - 3 September 1634) was an early English colonial entrepreneur and jurist whose writings on the English common law were the definitive legal texts for some 300 years. ...
- But if a man makes a gift in tail, or a lease of life, the remainder to his right heirs, this remainder is void, and he hath the revision in him; for the ancestor during his life beareth in his body in judgment of law all his heirs, and therefore it is truly said that haeres est pars antecessoris. ("the heir is a part of the ancestor") And this appeareth in a common case, that if land be given to a man and his heirs, all his heirs are so totally in him as he may give the land to whom he will.
The law deemed that since no one is an "heir" until the person she inherits from dies, an attempt to create a remainder interest in the heir created no present interest at all. This interpretation draws strength by analogy from the common words of a conveyance in fee simple, "to N. and his heirs." This conveyance creates no present interest in any heir; why should a remainder do the same? Fee simple, also known as fee simple absolute or allodial, is a term of art in common law. ...
Why it makes a difference But if the heir receives the same interest in the property that he would have received either way, the Doctrine of Worthier Title would appear at first impression to be a distinction without a difference.
The rule divests heirs of interests they seem to have under instruments The rule makes a difference when property owners make inter vivos gifts of less than fee simple interests. Suppose Adam owns title to lands, and executes a deed "to Beulah for life, and then to Adam's heirs," Caleb and Dinah. Adam's intent in these words of conveyance would appear to be to grant Beulah a life estate, and then create a vested remainder interest in his heirs Caleb and Dinah. The remainder interest is vested because Adam is mortal; his death is certain to happen. But, since Caleb and Dinah are already Adam's heirs, their interest under the laws of descent is "worthier" than the interest they take under the instrument, and the deed is construed as if Adam had stopped with "to Beulah for life." A living trust (or inter vivos trust) is a type of trust created for the purpose of holding ownership to an individuals assets during the persons lifetime, and for distributing those assets after death. ...
This page is about gifts in the common English-language sense. ...
Fee simple, also known as fee simple absolute or allodial, is a term of art in common law. ...
A deed is a legal instrument used to grant a privilege. ...
A life estate, at common law is an estate in real property that ends at death. ...
In mathematics, the result of the division of two integers usually cannot be expressed with an integer quotient, unless a remainder —an amount left over— is also acknowledged. ...
The reversionary interest Caleb and Dinah were meant to have in the land subject to Beulah's life estate would have been a vested interest as the conveyance was written, but that vested interest is wiped out by the Doctrine of Worthier Title. Imagine then that Adam then falls on hard times, and his creditors take judgments against him. If the deed were given effect as written, Caleb and Dinah's vested rights to the remainder interest would have existed prior to any judgment liens, and would therefore be prior in right to the claims of Adam's creditors. The Doctrine of Worthier Title, preferring title by intestate succession over title by the instrument, wipes out that vested interest and prefers the rights of Adam's creditors over the rights of Adam's heirs. The Doctrine of Worthier Title, by its terms, does not affect the right passed from the ancestor to the heir; it can operate to cut off rights of the heirs against third parties. Vested interests are people or groups who stand to gain financially from some policy, usually a public policy. ...
A creditor is a party (e. ...
A judgment or judgement, in a legal context, is synonymous with the formal decision made by a court following legal proceedings. ...
In law, lien is the broadest term for any sort of charge or encumbrance against an item of property that secures the payment of a debt or performance of some other obligation. ...
Intestacy refers to the body of common law that determines who is entitled to the property of a dead person in the absence of a last will and testament or other binding declaration. ...
It makes a difference who your heirs are The Doctrine of Worthier Title can also affect estates created by will, when those estates are in people who would not take by intestate succession. Suppose once more that Adam is a testator whose good friends in life were Beulah and Caleb; Adam's child is Dinah. Under applicable state laws of intestate succession, Dinah would be Adam's heir if Adam had no will.
But Adam does have a will: it leaves his land "to Beulah for life, then to Adam's heirs." Adam's will also contains a residuary clause that leaves the remainder of Adam's estate to Caleb. By the operation of the instrument, Beulah would have a life estate, then "Adam's heirs" — i.e. Dinah — would have a vested remainder interest. The Doctrine of Worthier Title intervenes, however, with unexpected results. The Doctrine prefers the interest "Adam's heirs" would have taken to the interest created by an instrument. Here, however, Adam's will designates Caleb as his heir at law. Instead of a life estate in Beulah, followed by a vested remainder in Dinah, the Doctrine of Worthier Title operates to disinherit Dinah, treats the interest of the heirs as a mere reversion, and gives the property to Caleb instead.
Obsolescence of the doctrine The Doctrine of Worthier Title can be avoided by naming specific people or classes of people — e.g. "my children" — instead of using the phrase "my heirs". As such, the Doctrine of Worthier Title seldom comes into play. The doctrine has also been abolished, either by statute or by judicial decisions, in many common law jurisdictions. In some jurisdictions, the rule survives, but only as a presumption or a rule of construction, that can be rebutted by evidence that the grantor meant otherwise. A statute is a formal, written law of a country or state, written and enacted by its legislative authority, perhaps to then be ratified by the highest executive in the government, and finally published. ...
In common law, a rebuttable presumption is an assumption that is made that will stand as a fact unless someone comes forward to contest it and prove otherwise. ...
References - Dillman v. Fulwider, 57 Ind.App. 632, 105 N.E. 124 (Ind. Ct. App. 1914)
- Moore v. Livingston, 148 Ind.App. 275, 265 N.E.2d 251 (Ind. Ct. App. 1970)
- Robertson v. Robertson, 120 Ind. 333, 22 N.E. 310 (Sup. Ct. Ind. 1889)
- Black's Law Dictionary, 5th ed., 1979, ISBN 0-8299-2041-2
|
Feeds |
Contact