AN ALPHABETICAL INDEX*

to facilitate the use of the preceding Table.

In this Index titles too general, (e. g. "Tenant in tail" and the like,) have been omitted as useless. The reader must not consider this as an Index to the Acts. The numbers in the Index refer to the sections of the Table.

N

Corporations, other than spiritual or eleemosynary, barred by

verse possession;

MR. BRODIE'S Opinion on the Effect of the new Statute of Limitations, (3 & 4 Will. 4, c. 27,) with reference, chiefly, to the Rule requiring a Sixty Years' title.

A GOOD title by means of an adverse possession of twenty years cannot be acquired so long as real actions can be brought. By the 37th section, these actions may be brought at any time before the 1st of June, 1835.

As, by the 1st section, the word person is made to extend to a body politic, corporate, or collegiate, corporations of all twenty years' ad descriptions, (except such as are spiritual or eleemosynary, for which a special provision is made by the 29th section, and except the crown,) will, by the 2d section, when it comes into full operation, be barred by twenty years' adverse possession. The crown must have been specially named to have been barred.

-but not the Crown.

Twenty years' adverse possession a bar to estates for life, in fee, and in tail, and estates ulterior to estates tail.

But possession adverse to a life

estate does not run against those in remainder or re version,

When there are no disabilities, then under the 2d, 21st and 22d sections, an adverse possession of twenty years, and when there are disabilities, then an adverse possession for the periods fixed in the 16th, 17th and 18th sections, will bar either an estate for life, or an estate in fee, or an estate tail, and all estates to take effect after or in defeasance of an estate tail; and by the 23d section, a possession for twenty years by a person entitled under an assurance by a tenant in tail, which shall not bar the estates to take effect after or in defeasance of the estate tail, will have the effect of barring the same. (a)

But possession adverse to a tenant for life, will not run on against a remainder-man or reversioner, so that although a tenant for life may be barred by an adverse possession of twenty years, it would, except in the case specified in the

(a) Sed vide suprà, 149.

MR. BRODIE'S OPINION ON THE NEW STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS.

20th section, require another period of adverse possession, commencing from the death of the tenant for life, to bar a remainder-man or reversioner.

179

session for twenty

constitute a mar

ketable or safe

title.

It follows, from what I have above stated, that no pur--therefore poschaser can be satisfied with a vendor's title depending solely years does not on an undisturbed possession of twenty years; as the person to whom such possession may have been adverse may be only a tenant for life, or may have been at the time when the adverse possession commenced under some of the disabilities noticed in the 16th section. In all cases, therefore, a vendor, in undisturbed possession for twenty years, must, by the production of the previous title, show, either that he lawfully obtained such possession, and that he has the estate and interest which he professes to sell, or that his possession, being adverse, the estates and interests of the parties rightfully entitled have been barred by such adverse possession. It is a mistake, therefore, and at present a very prevalent one amongst professional gentlemen who have not duly considered the subject, to suppose that in consequence of the new Statute of Limitations, a purchaser will not be warranted in requiring the abstract of title to go so far back as under the old system. I have known an instance of a person being tenant for life for more than eighty years. Such a person might have been dispossessed at the time when his right. first accrued. An adverse possession to him during the whole period of his life, would not have made a good title against the remainder-man or reversioner under the old law, nor will it do so under the new law.

Abstracts must

show title for as

long a period as

under the old sys

tem.

of titles, is the

a writ of right,

but to the life of

It is a common notion that the present length of abstracts The measure of the period fixed is with reference to the limitation of sixty years. This is for the deduction quite a mistake. It is with reference to the duration of human limitation, not to life; and so long as the law will not allow a remainder-man expectant on an estate for life to be barred by a possession adverse to the tenant for life, a purchaser will be entitled to require a title to be shown for the same period as heretofore under the old law.

man.

180

Titles to advowsons must be deduced for one handred years.

MR. BRODIE'S OPINION ON THE NEW STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS.

Advowsons are specially provided for by the 30th, 31st, 32d and 33d sections, and the length of abstracts as to them must be with reference to the period of one hundred years fixed by the last of those sections. The provisions in these sections are very salutary, as, according to the old law, no person purchasing an advowson could ever be pronounced safe, since the old statutes of limitation did not apply to advowsons.

QUESTIONS

RELATIVE TO THE

EXISTING DIVISION OF THE OWNERSHIP

INTO

LEGAL AND EQUITABLE.

These questions (which are referred to suprà, p. 41), were suggested to the Writer by considerations connected with the plan of a General Registry, though the connection is not immediately apparent (but see the Tract alluded to in the Preface to this work), and were drawn up in consequence of certain alterations contemplated by the Real Property Commissioners, and certain questions (a) prepared by them.

1. If the limitation of a use upon a use had not been excluded from the operation of the Statute of Uses, what would have been the state of the law of real property under that statute, with reference as well to passive uses, imposing no duty upon the grantee, as to active uses, imposing a duty upon him?

2. Was not the construction put upon the statute absurd, inasmuch as if before the statute land had been conveyed to A. to the use of B., to the use of C., a purchaser, the use would have belonged to C., and not to B., in whom nevertheless a statute designed to transfer uses into possession is made to deposit the estate?

3. Has not this perverse construction led to the frequent separation of the equitable or beneficial right from the legal estate, and has not such separation rendered titles complex

(a) These questions will be found at the end of the volume.