Law Dictionary
To search for a particular term please use the following search box.
Click on a category to see available terms for that category.
- Banking Law
- Canon Law
- Civil Law
- Civil Rights
- Commercial Law
- Common Law
- Consumer Law
- Contract Law
- Contracts
- Corporate Law
- Courts
- Criminal Law
- Employment Law
- English Law
- Family Law
- Feudal Law
- French Law
- General Practice
- Government
- Health Law
- Immigration Law
- Insurance Law
- Intellectual Property Law
- International Law
- Investment Law
- Latin Terms
- Maritime Law
- Military Law
- Monarchy
- Obsolete
- Real Estate Law
- Roman Law
- Scottish Law
- Spanish Law
- Tax Law
- Torts
- Transportation Law
- Trusts and Estates
- Water Law
legitime
civil law. That portion of a parent's estate of which he cannot disinherit his children, without a legal cause. The civil code of Louisiana declares that donations inter vivos or mortis causa cannot exceed two-thirds of the property of the disposer if he leaves at his decease a legitimate child; one half if he leaves two children; and one-third if he leaves three or a greater number. Under the name of children are included descendants of whatever degree they may be; it must be understood that they are only counted for the child they represent. Civil. Code of Lo. art. 1480.
3. Donation inter vivos or mortis causa, cannot exceed two-thirds of the property if the disposer having no children have a father, mother, or both. Id. art. 1481. Where there are no descendants, and in case of the previous decease of the father and mother, donations inter vivos and mortis causa, may, in general, be made of the whole amount of the property of the disposer. Id. art. 1483. The Code Civil makes nearly similar previsions. Code Civ. L. 3, t. 2, c. 3, s. 1, art. 913 to 919.
4. In Holland, Germany, and Spain, the principles of the Falcidian law, more or less limited, have been generally adopted. Coop. Just. 616.
5. In the United States, other than Louisiana and in England, there is no restriction on the right of bequeathing. But this power of bequeathing did not originally extend to all a man's personal estate; on the contrary, by the common law, as it stood in the reian of Henry II, a man's goods were to be divided into three equal parts, one of which went to his heirs or lineal descendants, another to his wife, and the third was at his own disposal; or if he died without a wife, he might then dispose of one moiety, and the other went to his children; and so e converso if he had no children, the wife was entitled to one moiety, and he might bequeath the other; but if he died without either wife or issue, the whole was at his own disposal. Glanv. 1. 2, c. 6;, Bract. 1. 2, c. 26. The shares of the wife and children were called their reasonable part. 2 Bl. Comm. 491-2. See Death's part; Falcidian law.
Source : Bouvier 1856
Language : English