Shockley v. Parvis
Superior Court of Delaware
Ejectment and case stated for forty-five acres of land in Cedar Creek Hundred, Sussex County, which were devised in the last will and testament of Wilson Shockley, deceased, as follows : Item.
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Ejectment and case stated for forty-five acres of land in Cedar Creek Hundred, Sussex County, which were devised in the last will and testament of Wilson Shockley, deceased, as follows : Item. “I give and devise to my son John W. Shockley a certain piece of timbered land and cleared land (describing the metes and bounds of it particularly) I give and devise all the above mentioned land to my son John W. Shockley, his heirs and assigns forever, upon condition that he pays to my estate the sum of four hundred dollars lawful money of the United States of America.” By the residuary clause in the…
1Opinion of the Court
This is a conditional devise. The object of a condition in a deed or will is to avoid or defeat an estate if the condition shall not be performed or complied with. Such a condition may be either precedent or subsequent, according to the intention of the person who creates it, there being no technical words to distinguish one from the other. 1 Powell on Devise, 183. But the effect and operation of the two kinds of conditions are very different and important.
Precedent conditions must be literally performed, and even a Court of Chancery will never vest an estate when by reason of a condition…
2Cases cited1 opinion
- Van Kleeck v. Ministers of the Reformed Dutch ChurchNew York Court of Chancery · 1837
3Cited by2 opinions
- Dunham v. StoneSupreme Court of New Hampshire · 1950
- Dunham v. StoneSupreme Court of New Hampshire · 1950