Lessee of Ashton v. Ashton, 1 U.S. 4 (1760) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Case citation is a system used by legal professionals to identify past court case decisions, either in series of books called reporters or law reports, or in a neutral style that identifies a decision regardless of where it is reported. Case citations are formatted differently in different jurisdictions, but generally contain the same key information.
Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state located in the Northeastern, Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The Appalachian Mountains run through its middle. The Commonwealth is bordered by Delaware to the southeast, Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, Lake Erie and the Canadian province of Ontario to the northwest, New York to the north, and New Jersey to the east.
The United States Reports are the official record of the Supreme Court of the United States. They include rulings, orders, case tables, in alphabetical order both by the name of the petitioner and by the name of the respondent, and other proceedings. United States Reports, once printed and bound, are the final version of court opinions and cannot be changed. Opinions of the court in each case are prepended with a headnote prepared by the Reporter of Decisions, and any concurring or dissenting opinions are published sequentially. The Court's Publication Office oversees the binding and publication of the volumes of United States Reports, although the actual printing, binding, and publication are performed by private firms under contract with the United States Government Publishing Office.
Colonial and Early State Court Cases in the United States Reports
None of the decisions appearing in the first volume and most of the second volume of the United States Reports are actually decisions of the United States Supreme Court. Instead, they are decisions from various Pennsylvania courts, dating from the colonial period and the first decade after Independence. Alexander Dallas, a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania lawyer and journalist, had been in the business of reporting these cases for newspapers and periodicals. He subsequently began compiling his case reports in a bound volume, which he called Reports of cases ruled and adjudged in the courts of Pennsylvania, before and since the Revolution.[1] This would come to be known as the first volume of Dallas Reports.
Alexander James Dallas was an American statesman who served as the U.S. Treasury Secretary under President James Madison.
When the United States Supreme Court, along with the rest of the new Federal Government, moved in 1791 to the nation's temporary capital in Philadelphia, Dallas was appointed the Supreme Court's first unofficial and unpaid Supreme Court Reporter. (Court reporters in that age received no salary, but were expected to profit from the publication and sale of their compiled decisions.) Dallas continued to collect and publish Pennsylvania decisions in a second volume of his Reports, and when the Supreme Court began hearing cases, he added those cases to his reports, starting towards the end of the second volume, 2 Dallas Reports. Dallas would go on to publish a total of four volumes of decisions during his tenure as Reporter.
The Reporter of Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States is the official charged with editing and publishing the opinions of the Supreme Court of the United States, both when announced and when they are published in permanent bound volumes of the United States Reports. The Reporter of Decisions is responsible for only the contents of the United States Reports issued by the Government Printing Office, first in preliminary prints and later in the final bound volumes. The Reporter is not responsible for the editorial content of unofficial reports of the Court's decisions, such as the privately published Supreme Court Reporter or Lawyers' Edition.
In 1874, the U.S. government created the United States Reports, and numbered the volumes previously published privately as part of that series, starting from the first volume of Dallas Reports. The four volumes Dallas published were retitled volumes 1 - 4 of United States Reports.[2] As a result, the complete citation to Lessee of Ashton v Ashton is 1 U.S. 4 (1 Dallas 4) (1760).
The Decision
According to Dallas's annotations, an unknown party known only as the "deviser" (the maker of a will by which real property is given as a gift after death), made a will by which he devised real estate to "the first Heir Male of I. S. when he shall Arrive to the Age of 21 Years" so long as that first male heir of I. S. paid the sum of 40 pounds to each of I. S.'s daughters, designated "A" and "B". When the deviser died, I. S. only had the two daughters. Some time later, I. S. had a son, who reached the age of 21 years and paid his two sisters their 40 pounds each.
The pound is a unit of currency in some nations. The term originated in the Frankish Empire as a result of Charlemagne's currency reform and was subsequently taken to Great Britain as the value of a pound (weight) of silver.
The issue before the court was whether the son of I. S. could take under the deviser's will. Dallas reported that the defendant made three arguments. First, since the son of I. S. did not exist either at the time the will was made, or at the time of the deviser's death, the son could not take under the will. Second, even if the devise might be construed as a "future devise", the interest was too remote under the rule that a future interest must take effect within the lifetime of a life in being at the time of the deviser's death, (or within 9 months thereafter, in the event of an unborn heir). Moreover, even if one of I. S.'s daughters, or grand-daughters, or an even later female descendant bore a son, who might arguably become I. S.'s male heir, that heir could not inherit under the rule against perpetuities. The third argument was that, since I. S. was apparently still alive, he could have no heir under the legal maxim "Nemo est Hares Viventis". ("No one is the heir of a living person.")[3]
In property law and real estate, a future interest is a legal right to property ownership that does not include the right to present possession or enjoyment of the property. Future interests are created on the formation of a defeasible estate; that is, an estate with a condition or event triggering transfer of possessory ownership. A common example is the landlord-tenant relationship. The landlord may own a house, but has no general right to enter it while it is being rented. The conditions triggering the transfer of possession, first to the tenant then back to the landlord, are usually detailed in a lease.
The rule against perpetuities is a legal rule in the Anglo-American common law that prevents people from using legal instruments to exert control over the ownership of property for a time long beyond the lives of people living at the time the instrument was written. Specifically, the rule forbids a person from creating future interests in property that would vest beyond 21 years after the lifetimes of those living at the time of creation of the interest. In essence, the rule prevents a person from putting qualifications and criteria in a deed or a will that would continue to affect the ownership of property long after he or she has died, a concept often referred to as control by the "dead hand" or "mortmain".
The plaintiff responded by arguing, first that this was not a "present Devise", because the devisor would have known at the time he made his will that I. S. did not at that time have a male heir. Second, the "Contingency" (that I. S. would have a son that reached the age of 21 and paid his two sisters their 40 pounds each), was not too remote for purposes of the rule against perpetuities, because it was clear that the devisor intended that the first son of I. S. take, not some more distant descendant, and that the deviser's intent should be respected.
The court ruled that the deviser's clear intent was that first son of I. S. should take, and that his intentions should be enforced.
It is not clear from the record of the decision or from Dallas's annotations what relationship "the deviser" or I. S. or the son of I. S. had to either Ashton or Ashton's Lessee, the parties to the proceeding before the court.
Precedential Effect
Over a century after Lessee of Ashton v. Ashton (or as it is sometimes cited, Ashton v. Ashton) was decided, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court would cite it as precedent for the proposition that the word "heirs" means "children" in the case of Appeal of Porter45 Pa 201 (1863)
Notes
↑ Cohen, Morris and O'Connor, Sharon H. A Guide to the Early Reports of the Supreme Court of the United States, (Fred B. Rothman & Co, Littleton Colorado, 1995)
↑ Hall, Kermit, ed. Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States (Oxford 1992), p 215, 727
This is a list of all the cases from volume 1 of the United States Reports. None of the decisions appearing in the first volume and only a few in the second volume of United States Reports are actually decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States. Instead, they are decisions from various Pennsylvania courts dating from the colonial period and the first decade after independence. Alexander J. Dallas, a Philadelphia lawyer and journalist, had been in the business of reporting these cases for newspapers and periodicals. He subsequently began compiling his case reports in a bound volume, which he called Reports of cases ruled and adjudged in the courts of Pennsylvania, before and since the Revolution. This and the three additional volumes he later produced would come to be known as the Dallas Reports.
Lessee of Hyam v. Edwards, is the title of two separate decisions of the Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. The first decision is found at 1 U.S. 1 (1759) and is the first decision that appears in the first volume of United States Reports. The second decision is found at 1 U.S. 2 (1759).
Lessee of Weston v Stammers, 1 U.S. 2 (1759) were two separate decisions of the Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. They are a among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Stevenson v. Pemberton, 1 U.S. 3 (1760) is a decision of the Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Hewes v. M'Dowell, 1 U.S. 5 (1762) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Lessee of Fothergill v. Fothergill, 1 U.S. 6 (1763) is a decision of the Pennsylvania Provincial Supreme Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
The King v. Lukens, 1 U.S. 5 (1762) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Nixon and Harper v. Long and Plumstead, 1 U.S. 6 (1762) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Wallace v. Child, 1 U.S. 7 (1763) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Price v. Watkins, 1 U.S. 8 (1763) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
The King v. Haas, 1 U.S. 9 (1764) is a decision of a Pennsylvania provincial court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports, and is among the earliest surviving reports of judicial proceedings in North America. It is also one of the first attempts to apply the writ of habeas corpus, then an established principle of English law, in the English colonies that later became the first thirteen states of the United States of America.
The King v. Rapp 1 U.S. 9 (1764) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports, and is among the earliest surviving court decisions in North America.
Lessee of Albertson v. Robeson, 1 U.S. 9 (1764) is a decision of a Pennsylvania Provincial Court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports.
Lessee of Richardson v. Campbell, 1 U.S. 10 (1764) is a decision of a Pennsylvania provincial court, issued when Pennsylvania was still an English colony. It is among the first decisions that appear in the first volume of United States Reports, and is among the earliest surviving reports of judicial proceedings in North America. It is also one of the first applications of the Statute of Frauds, then an established principle of English law, in the English colonies that later became the first thirteen states of the United States of America.
References
Hall, Kermit, ed. Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States (Oxford 1992),
Goebel, Jr., Julius, The Oliver Wendell Holmes Devise History of the Supreme Court of the United States Volume 1: Antecedents and Beginnings to 1801 (Macmillan, 1971)
Walters, Jr., Raymond, Alexander Dallas: Lawyer -- Politician -- Financier, 1759 - 1817 (Da Capo Press, 1969)
Lessee of Ashton v. Ashton, 1 U.S. 4 (1 Dall. 4) (1760)
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