ISBN: 9781459004665

Unknown Author, Books Group, Paperback, English-language edition, Pub by General Books LLC Books The-American-Law-Register~~Unknown-Author General Books LLC Purchase of this book include… Altro …

Unknown Author, Books Group, Paperback, English-language edition, Pub by General Books LLC Books The-American-Law-Register~~Unknown-Author General Books LLC Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LAW REGISTER FOUNDED 1852. UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA DEPARTMENT OF LAW vw-(j'n's) FEBRUARY, 1898. No. 2. THE AMOUNT WHICH MAY BE GIVKN BY A DONOR MORTIS CAUSA. At Law. The law of the Twelve Tables allowed a testator to dispose of all his effects to the exclusion of the heir; but the love of offspring which may be relied on in the case of descendants known to be such, must have become of questionable applicability in the decadence of Roman virtue. At a time when respectable matrons found it advantageous to be entered on the municipal lists of prostitutes, it was necessary that the law should throw some protection around the heir. The Itx Faicidia was a plcfnscitiini passed 714 A. U. C. It required that there should be left to the heir at least one- fourth of the property of the testator. Justinian altered the proportions to a half or a third, according to the number of heirs. The emperor Severus extended the lex Faicidia to donations mortis causa. In English and American polity, the shameful necessity of such a law has not been experienced. With us, no limit has been fixed at law beyond which donations mortis causa are forbidden. As is said in Kent,1 a " branch of parental duty consists inmaking competent provision according to the condition and circumstances of the father, for the future welfare and settlement of the child; but this duty is not susceptible of municipal regulations, and it is usually left to the dictates of reason and natural affection. Our laws have not interfered on this point, and have left every man to dispose of his property as he pleases, and to point out in his discretion the path his children ought to pursue. ... A father may at his death devise all his estate to strangers, and leave his children upon the parish; and the public can ha...<