Thompson v. Watkins

SHARP, Justice.

The question presented is whether the widow, at the time of her death, owned the land in controversy in fee simple or held it as trustee for plaintiffs. To answer this question we must review the relationship between a life tenant and remain-derman and the duties each owes the other with relation to encumbrances on the land in which they hold successive interests.

A file tenant’s relation to the remainderman is a quasi-fiduciary one in the sense that he must exercise reasonable care to preserve the property intact for transmission to the remainderman and in that he can legally…