The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1871-03-25 00:00:00

A NICE POINT IN LAW.

In the Court of Chancery, the cause of .• Boyer e. West"
has been heard, and wes a one arising no the construction
of a will by which George Brooks, the taiator, had settled
a sum of £BO,OOO upon his daughter for life, and after her
decease upon a trust the validity of which was now to be
determined by the Court :
The words of the trust were that after the death of
of the testator's daughter the fund was to be held for
all and every her child or children, who, being a son,
or none, should attain the age of 28, or, being a
daughter or daughtere ehould attain that age or marry.
The testator left one daughter, who has since died,
leaving an only eon, and the question is whether that
eon is or is not entitled, under the grandfather'. will, to
the £to 000, By the rules of law any gift is void unless
it necessarily vests in its object—or, where the gift is
to a class, unless the members of the class can be
ascertained -within p life or lives in being or within
21 years afterwards, the time beiug calculated in the
case of gifts into. riros from the date of the gift, and
In teetamentAry dispositions from the death of the
testator. This rule, which is generally known as the
rule against perpetuities, is so strictly adhered to that
even the actual course of events is not taken into con-
sideration, the mere fact that by aey possibility the
gift could not vest being sufficient to decide its in.
validity. In the present case it was argued on
behalf of the infant that a subsequent direction in the
will that the income was to be applied to the main.
tenance and education of the children, and for the
accumulation of the surplus until they attained the
age of 23, constituted such a diepomition of the property
for their benefit as to take it out of the operation of
the rule.

The Vice-Chancellor, at the conclusion of the argil.
insults, said there was no doubt about the law in this
case. The only doubt arose as to the language of the
testator. If there had been a trust created of the in-
come of the property for the grandchildren of the tes-
tator and a direction that the 2apital should he paid at
23, that would have been valid, and not too remote.
But if instead of that it was a trust in favour of grand-
children, who could take nothing until 23, the gift
failed. After adverting to the language of the mainte-
nance and education clause, and observing that the
trust in question attached to shares which did not vest
till a period too remote for the gift to be effectual
in law, the Vice-Chancellor said the law was this—no
limitation could be too remote where there was an im-
mediate gift of the whole income of the subject matter
of the gift for the benefit of a person who was at a re-
mote period to take the gift absolutely. But where
the trust is a trust which is expressed as of the income
of a share which is given to a peon who by law can
take no share, there being no valid gift of the share,
there can be no valid gift or trust of the income to
arise from a share the existence of which is prohikited
at law, and the limitation in the will in favour of the
daughter's children must, therefore, be held to be void.