Law Commons^™

Judicial Review Of The Compensation Law In Hungary, Peter Paczolay

Michigan Journal of International Law

This article analyzes the Hungarian Constitutional Court's decisions regarding a specific problem of property rights, namely the Compensation Law. It does not attempt to examine the details of broad subjects such as property rights or privatization.

Icons And Aliens: Law, Aesthetics, And Environmental Change, Scott Schrader

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Icons and Aliens: Law, Aesthetics, and Environmental Change by John J. Costonis

Women And The Law Of Property In Early America, David H. Bromfield

Michigan Law Review

A Review of Women and the Law of Property in Early America by Marylynn Salmon

The Recovery Of Shipwrecks In International Waters: A Multilateral Solution, Elizabeth Barrowman

Michigan Journal of International Law

This Note will examine the current state of international law concerning property rights to all types of wrecks discovered in international waters. It will show that a multilateral convention is needed to establish an international framework for property rights to shipwrecks of historical and archaeological value, to wrecks of military vessels, and to wrecks of commercial ships such as the Titanic. There may be obstacles to the establishment of a multilateral convention, but the international community must provide certainty to ownership questions, furnish protection for submarine antiquities, and prevent disputes arising from the wrongful salvage of military vessels.

Republicanism And The Law Of Inheritance In The American Revolutionary Era, Stanley N. Katz

Michigan Law Review

This Article deals with the history of the law of inheritance during the era of the American Revolution, but its focus is actually more general, for it ultimately seeks to determine what sort of revolution we experienced. For the historian the problem is quite familiar, but a few observations seem pertinent. It is at least possible to argue that our colonial forefathers were not waging a revolution at all. Rather, one might say they were fighting what we should now call a colonial war of independence in which the overriding issue was "home rule." On this hypothesis, the main slogan …

Constitutional Law-Fourth Amendment-Exclusion Of Contraband Evidence Obtained By An Illegal Search On Premises Not Owned By Defendant, Edgar A. Strause

Michigan Law Review

The defendant was in the unlawful possession of narcotics. Having been given a key by his two aunts to their hotel room with authority to use the room at will, defendant stored the narcotics there without the knowledge of the occupants. A federal officer entered the hotel room, searched the room, and seized the narcotics during the absence of the occupants, without a search warrant. The defendant was arrested the following day and claimed ownership of the seized narcotics. He was convicted in the District Court of the District of Columbia for violation of federal law, the court refusing to …

Divorce-Separation For Statutory Period As A Ground Of Divorce Regardless Of Fault, William R. Hewitt S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

H sued W for a divorce on the statutory grounds that the parties had lived apart without cohabitation for ten years. The facts showed that the separation was caused by the willful abandonment of W by H and that H had lived in adultery after the separation and had not contributed to W's support since the separation. The trial court denied the divorce. On appeal, held, reversed. Where H and W have lived apart for the statutory period without cohabitation, H was entitled to the divorce regardless of the cause of the original separation and regardless of his …

Insurance-Gift-Right Of Named Beneficiary Of Life Policy To Proceeds As Against A Donee By Delivery, Bruce L. Moore S.Ed.

Michigan Law Review

Insured, in accordance with the terms of a life insurance policy, named the woman with whom he was then living as beneficiary. Subsequently, he returned to his wife and handed the policy to her with appropriate words indicating an intention to make a present and absolute delivery of it to her as a gift. No notice of a change of beneficiary was given to the insurance company. The policy reserved the right to insured to change the beneficiary by filing a written request with the company, such change to take effect only when indorsed on the policy by the company. …

Domestic Relations-Recent Developments (A Service For Returning Veterans), John S. Bradway

Michigan Law Review

During the past five years family life in America has been subjected to unusual strains. The repercussions of the war, as well as the usual peacetime factors, affecting the domestic circle have received attention of sociologists and lay writers. The legal implications have not made such prompt appearance in published form.

Information as to that part of the impact of family dislocation caused by war is available in many places, none the least important being the records in the offices of legal assistance officers in the armed forces, of the Committees on War Work set up by the American and …

Public Officers - Liability Of Federal Officers For Quasi-Judlcial Acts, Arthur M. Hoffeins

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiff sought to withdraw a registration statement which he had filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The commission denied him the right to do so and applied for a court order to enforce a previously issued subpoena to compel the plaintiff to appear before it and to produce books relating to the registration statement. After the Supreme Court had upheld the plaintiff's right to withdraw the statement, he brought an action for damages against the members of the commission for malicious prosecution, libel and slander, etc., alleging in addition that the defendants had acted maliciously and in bad faith. …

Unfair Competition - Unauthorized Broadcasts Of Baseball Games, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

The Pittsburgh Athletic Club sold to sponsors the exclusive right to broadcast the home baseball games of the Pittsburgh Pirates. The sponsors contracted with the National Broadcasting Corporation for the use of two stations. Station KQV, knowing of this arrangement, posted observers on leased premises outside and overlooking the ball park and proceeded to broadcast play-by-play accounts of the games. Each admission ticket contained a stipulation that the holder was not to transmit or aid in transmitting reports of the games outside the park. The athletic club, the sponsors, and the N.B.C. jointly brought an action for an injunction against …

Municipal Corporations - Liability To Abutting Property Owner For Negligence In Spraying Trees On Highway, Arthur A. Greene Jr.

Michigan Law Review

The defendant, a municipal corporation, used a poison spray on the trees on the highway under the authority and express duty of certain statutes that declared browntail moths and other insects a nuisance. This was done in such a manner that a part of the spray fell on the abutting land of the plaintiff, and caused the death of her poultry. The plaintiff instituted this action, relying on two counts, one alleging negligence and the other alleging an unreasonable use of the highway. Held, that the plaintiff could not recover on the first count because the abatement of this …

Torts - Unfair Competition - Preventing Formation Of Contract, Anthony L. Dividio

Michigan Law Review

The Supreme Court of Minnesota was recently confronted with an interesting problem in the case of Johnson v. Gustafson. Real property was listed by the owner with the plaintiff, a real estate broker, who was to receive a $300 commission if she found a purchaser therefor. The plaintiff interested one Clarity in the property, but no offer to purchase was made. Desiring the property but being unwilling to pay the full price of $6,000, Clarity induced his friend Gustafson to purchase it for $5,700 with Clarity's money, directly from the owner, who had a right to sell it himself …

Contracts - Moral Obligation As Consideration - Promise To Pay For Benefits Previously Received, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

Plaintiffs, assignees of an oil lease of land, after drilling a dry hole thereon, did not comply with the requirements of their agreement for further development within a stipulated time, in consequence of which there was a formal termination in accordance with the terms of the assignment. An extension of the lease, which the lessees obtained, was assigned to the defendants, who had knowledge of the foregoing circumstances and plaintiffs' claim of a property right in the dry hole. Defendants promised to pay plaintiffs for the use of the dry hole, but subsequently repudiated any liability on the promise. Held …

Injunction-Right To Labor As Property-Clayton Act

Michigan Law Review

The Texas & New Orleans R R engaged in promoting the organization of an association among its clerical employees in the nature of a company union. Its purpose was to secure control over the selection of representatives by the employees in the board of mediation provided for by the Railway Labor Act of 1926 (U. S. C. tit. 45, c. 8, par. 152). The Brotherhood of Railway Clerks sought an injunction against such interference on the ground that the Railway Labor Act prohibited "interference, influence, or coercion exercised by either party over the self-organization or designation of representatives by the …

Change In The Meaning Of Consortium, Evans Holbrook

Articles

LAWYERS have long boasted of the flexibility of the common law, of its ability to adapt itself to the needs of changing conditions of society, of its responsiveness to sociological progress. And while eager reformers have often-and with much reason complained that the law is laggard in its response to the needs of the people, yet it is clear that sooner or later the courts generally bring themselves into accord with "what is sanctioned by usage, or held by the prevailing morality or strong and preponderant public 'opinion to be greatly and immediately necessary to the public welfare." This responsiveness …

The Statute Of Uses And Active Trusts, Edgar N. Durfee

Articles

To explain the survival of uses, alias trusts, after the Statute of Uses, one is probably justified in assuming a sympathetic attitude toward this Equitable institution on the part of the Common Law Judges. Maitland, Equity, 29. But, however predisposed the Judges might be, they would have to satisfy themselves, perhaps others as well, that they were interpreting rather than nullifying the Statute. Only such uses could be saved as could be "distinguished." The case of the use raised upon a chattel interest is clear enough, as it was without the letter, and fairly without the mischief, of the Statute. …

Inquiry Concerning Justice, Floyd R. Mechem

Michigan Law Review

Justice, said Daniel Webster, "is the greatest interest of man on earth." Alexander Hamilton, in the Federalist, declared "Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It has ever been, and ever will be, pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit."

Taking Of Equitable Easements For Public Use, Edgar N. Durfee

Articles

The case of Flynn v. New York &c Railway Co., decided by the Court of Appeals of New York in April last, involves the right of an owner of land to which is appurtenant a so-called equitable easement, arising under a covenant restricting the use of other land, to compensation upon the taking of the servient land for a public use inconsistent with the restriction. A tract of land was laid out in accordance with a plan, and all, lots therein were sold and conveyed by deeds containing covenants, inter alia, that, "No building or structure for any business purpose …

Nature And Importance Of Legal Possession, Joseph W. Bingham

Michigan Law Review

To impress these unfamiliar facts on our consciousness, so that we shall not lose sight of them during the rest of our discussion, so that we shall not slur them or cloud them by vague use of symbolic ideas or terms concerning property and title, let us repeat the essence of the legal situation. Jackson is the holder of a fee simple acquired tortiously. His title to that fee--i. e. the facts which would induce the courts upon occasion to give him the remedies "vindicating" the existence of this vested fee in him--consist in his actual exclusive use and control …

Nature And Importance Of Legal Possession, Joseph W. Bingham

Michigan Law Review

The careful student of our law of property needs no demonstration of the importance of legal possession. From before the date of the earliest year book the word possession and its synonym seisin have pervaded legal language and have signified matters of great consequence in the decision of cases. "In the history of our law," say Pollock and Maitland, "there is no idea more cardinal than that of seisin. Even in the law of the present day it plays a part which must be studied by every lawyer; but in the past it was so important that we may almost …

Freedom Of Contract, Jerome C. Knowlton

Articles

The liberty mentioned in the Fourteenth Amendment of the Federal Constitution "means not only the right of the citizen to be free from the mere physical restraint of his person, as by incarceration, but the term is deemed to embrace the right of the citizen to be free in the enjoyment of all his faculties; to be free to use them in all lawful ways; to live and work where he will; to earn his livelihood by any lawful calling; to pursue any livelihood or avocation, and for that purpose to enter into all contracts which may be proper, necessary …

A Treatise On The Constitutional Limitations Which Rest Upon The Legislative Power Of The States Of The American Union, Thomas M. Cooley, Victor H. Lane

Books

“At the request of the late Judge Cooley I have undertaken the preparation of this edition of the Constitutional Limitations. It seemed desirable, in view of all the circumstances, that the text of the last edition should stand as the text for this, and the work of the present editor has been confined to the bringing of the book down to date, by the addition of such matter to the notes as will fairly present the development of this branch of the law since the publication of the last edition.” --Preface to the Seventh Edition, Victor H. Lane, Ann Arbor, …

A Treatise On The Constitutional Limitations Which Rest Upon The Legislative Power Of The States Of The American Union, Thomas M. Cooley

Books

In the Preface to the first edition of this work. the author stated its purpose to be, to furnish to the practitioner and the student of the law such a presentation of elementary constitutional principles as should serve, with the aid of its references to judicial decisions, legal treatises, and historical events, as a convenient guide in the examination of questions respecting the constitutional limitations which rest upon the power of the several State legislatures. …

Preface to the 4th Edition: "New topics in State Constitutional Law are not numerous; but such as are suggested by recent decisions have been …

A Treatise On The Constitutional Limitations Which Rest Upon The Legislative Power Of The States Of The American Union, Thomas M. Cooley

Books

In the Preface to the first edition of this work. the author stated its purpose to be, to furnish to the practitioner and the student of the law such a presentation of elementary constitutional principles as should serve, with the aid of its references to judicial decisions, legal treatises, and historical events, as a convenient guide in the examination of questions respecting the constitutional limitations which rest upon the power of the several State legislatures. … The second edition being exhausted, the author, in preparing a third, has endeavored to give full references to such decisions as have recently been …

A Treatise On The Constitutional Limitations Which Rest Upon The Legislative Power Of The States Of The American Union, Thomas M. Cooley

Books

In the Preface to the first edition of this work. the author stated its purpose to be, to furnish to the practitioner and the student of the law such a presentation of elementary constitutional principles as should serve, with the aid of its references to judicial decisions, legal treatises, and historical events, as a convenient guide in the examination of questions respecting the constitutional limitations which rest upon the power of the several State ·legislatures. In the accomplishment of that purpose, the author further stated that he had faithfully endeavored to give the law as it had been settled by …

A Treatise On The Constitutional Limitations Which Rest Upon The Legislative Power Of The States Of The American Union, Thomas M. Cooley

Books

“In these pages the author has faithfully endeavored to state the law as it has been settled by the authorities, rather than to present his own views. At the same time he will not attempt to deny -- what will probably be sufficiently apparent -- that he has written in full sympathy with all those restraints which the caution of the fathers has imposed upon the exercise of the powers of government, and with greater faith in the checks and balances of our republican system, and in correct conclusions by the general public sentiment, than in a judicious, prudent, and …