Riddle v. Harmon1 made my day. The case is about a woman who tried to disinherit her husband…
Mr. and Mrs. Riddle purchased a parcel of real estate, taking title as joint tenants. Several months before her death, Mrs. Riddle retained an attorney to plan her estate. After reviewing pertinent documents, he advised her that the property was held in joint tenancy and that, upon her death, the property would pass to her husband.
Distressed upon learning this, she requested that the joint tenancy be terminated so that she could dispose of her interest by will. […] Mrs. Riddle died 20 days later.
The husband objected to being disenfranchised. The court said tough:
That “two-to-transfer” notion stems from the English common law feoffment ceremony with livery of seisin. If the ceremony took place upon the land being conveyed, the grantor (feoffor) would hand a symbol of the land, such as a lump of earth or a twig, to the grantee (feoffee).
In order to complete the investiture of seisin it was necessary that the feoffor completely relinquish possession of the land to the feoffee.
It is apparent from the requirement of livery of seisin that one could not enfeoff oneself-that is, one could not be both grantor and grantee in a single transaction. Handing oneself a dirt clod is ungainly. Just as livery of seisin has become obsolete, so should ancient vestiges of that ceremony give way to modern conveyancing realities.
1 Riddle v. Harmon, 102 Cal. App. 3d 524 (Cal. App. 1st Dist. 1980)
3 Comments
Chère
March 12, 2009 at 1:29 pmI have to say, most of my favorite case quotes come from California. We have such witty judges here 🙂 Although, the downside of being a “bellweather” or legally progressive state is that I hear a lot of this: “so that’s the rule in California. Now here’s the rule everywhere else…” (this is assuming that a professor would actually tell us a black-letter rule in class…)
Chère
March 12, 2009 at 10:42 pmThe general rule. They don’t seem to care if we know the rule for the state we’re in – I guess they figure that’s what Bar prep is for?! 🙂