Samuel Freeman Miller

“ They all, however, relate to cases where a man has done this with property which was his own,-property on which he himself imposed the direction, or the incumbrance, which impeded creditors.
It is quite different where a man takes property by purchase or otherwise, which is subject to that direction or disposition when he receives it. It is no act of his which imposes the burden. ”

“ In that case, the mother of the bankrupt, Eaton, had bequeathed to him by will the income of a fund, with a condition in the trust that on his bankruptcy or insolvency the legacy should cease and go to his wife or children, if he had any, and if not, it should lapse into the general fund of the testator's estate, and be subject to other dispositions. The assignee of the bankrupt sued to recover the interest bequeathed to the bankrupt, on the ground that this condition was void as against public policy. ”

“ The fundamental vice of plain iffs' argument is to treat the case as though Fenn, owning this property absolutely as his own without restriction, had then fettered it, of his own accord, with the condition that it must always stand incumbered by a preferred lien to his fellow-members.
It is said that it is against the policy of the bankrupt law, against public policy, to permit a man to make in this or any other manner a standing or perpetual appropriation of his property to the prejudice of his general creditors ”