Johnson,
pp. 159-181: Rules Furthering
Marketability
Let’s
look at three rules by which the common law tried to keep families from
hoarding all the property.
A. The Destructibility of
Contingent Remainders
This
is more or less only for historical interest.
At
common law, lapses in the seisin were not allowed. Remainders weren’t allowed to spring. Contingent remainders were destroyed if they
didn’t take effect at the end of the prior estate. But this was before the Statute of Uses and
the recognition of executory interests.
Another
rule was that you could destroy a contingent remainder by acquiring both the
life estate and the (fictional) reversion “surrounding” the contingent
remainder and kind of “crush” it in between.
Vested remainders don’t get “crushed”.
But
by 1700, executory interests were indestructible. So how do you make indestructible future
interests at this point?
B. The Rule in Shelley’s Case
and the Doctrine of Worthier Title
Case: Seymour v. Heubaum
A. The Rule Against
Perpetuities
Case: North Carolina National
Bank v. Norris
T.
Shaffer and C. Mooney, The Planning and Drafting of Wills and Trusts, 173-179