Riggs v Palmer Case

(PRO argues) "If he had taken the property by force or undue influence had induced Francis Palmer into giving up his property, the law would not permit him to have any right to the property." Francis B Palmer made a will leaving a portion of his estate to his daughters and the rest to his grandson Defendant Elmer E Palmer. (508.1.1) Francis Palmer had freedom of contract in the will to give anyone his estate as he saw fitting. He saw it fitting to give Elmer his estate so he named Elmer the recipient of his estate in his will. Therefore Elmer did not use "Force" to be listed as heir to Francis". Francis made him owner of his estate on his own free will when he made the contract. Contrary to your assumption that Elmer took away Francis" property by force or undue influence. (Pro argues #12) "If both a will and life insurance are payable on death why should a murderer be permitted to receive one of these benefits if the court has already denied the other." Your position states that if both contracts are payable at death they are identical contracts therefore, the terms and risks are the same. One necessary condition found in both isn"t enough to conclude that the two contracts are the same and should be bound by the same rules. Workers Compensation and Automobile Insurance contracts are made payable upon injury but we can"t assume based on only that, that the two contracts terms are the same and are made enforceable/void for the same reason. If you enter into a contract with an Automobile Insurance Company and you fall while walking up the stairs at work and get injured you cannot expect the Auto Insurance policy to pay for your injury. Although injury is a condition to make a claim payable the terms does not state that particular injury in the terms for accepting a claim. The Auto policy lists the terms which make a claim payable or void and once agreed upon by the parties involved the court couldn"t intervene after and reasonably say "Workers Comp is made payable at injury like Automobile Insurance policies therefore the Automobile Company has the same terms and has to pay for the injury that occurred at work while walking up a flight of steps." That court action would impose a stipulation not intended for by the car insurance company. If however you do fall while walking up the stairs at your job, and injure yourself on the job, it is possible to qualify for Workers Comp because scenario is included/intended in the Workers Comp contract as one of the criteria to make the policy payable. Likewise if It"s my day off from work and I"m running errands, my car meets in an accident while I"m driving, it would be absurd for me to then want to file a claim with Workers Comp. Although the contract has a necessary condition of injury to make contract payable that particular injury isn"t covered by the terms and agreements in the Workers Comp contract. If the court was to then force Workers Comp to pay they would be imposing a stipulation not intended in the terms of contract. So although Wills and Life insurance policies are contracts payable at death. Life insurance policy"s list explicitly in terms of agreement that "If murder contract will be void and not payable, whereas wills particularly the one in question made by Francis Palmer did not explicitly list murder as a form of making it non payable. There"s no written law in a Will that says you can"t get the estate if you murder someone. Where there is no law, or it"s not listed as a term in the Will the courts cannot then add to the Will, or Contract. After it"s made legal to void it based on something not listed as one of the criteria"s in the contract. Only the testator could change those terms. (Pro argument #6.) It was the intention of law-makers that the inheritance in a will be rightfully passed on to the correct correspondents, however not if a correspondent was responsible for the murder of the testator. The only legal role of the courts in regards to wills after they are made legal by law is to ensure that the will is followed through with by making sure the testators wishes provided in the will and the owner listed by testator gets the estate contracted to him. Left up to the lawmakers intent they would not pass on the estate to a murderer However that final say-so is not left up to lawmakers. Lawmakers did not see it fit to make any law/statue to include murder as one of the ways it can void or change a will. They left that freedom-to-contract up to the divisors of the will, skilled lawyers, to account for such an issue in the terms of the contract. As long as a will passes the construction standard by law and isn"t unlawful it is fully enforceable by law. Elmer is entitled to the property not because it is a reward or punishment but because his grandfather made him the rightful owner of his estate and if that was his will the court cannot dictate who should get or who should not get it. Because "If the law chooses who gets his property they will be writing a whole new will and existing laws do not justify this action by courts." (518.2.10-11) Questions 1)Does a reasonable person have the right to give away his property to whoever he wants? 2)Are laws bound by the courts or is it that the courts are bound by the laws? 3)If a will is legalized isn"t it recognized as a binding contract? 4)Do you want to let the courts decide when they will not honor your legal wishes based on anything Other than Law ex, feelings. 5)I believe that emotions do have a place in law because some laws are enacted by public opinion. However there is a process that follows before public opinion can become law. It would be unfair to just jump from the feeling that something doesn"t sit right to your conscience to pushing it through and holding someone liable to the consequence of feeling of ill feelings by the courts. Would you agree or disagree? 6)If we do not uphold and safeguard the freedom of the people to contract with valid legal document what will happen to our property,rights and freedom in the future?