Hereditary right

“ The moment we begin to reason upon the hereditary system, it falls into derision; let but a single idea begin, and a thousand will soon follow. Insignificance, imbecility, childhood, dotage, want of moral character; in fine, every defect serious or laughable unite to hold up the hereditary system as a figure of ridicule. Leaving, however, the ridiculousness of the thing to the reflections of the reader, I proceed to the more important part of the question, namely, whether such a system has a right to exist. ”

“ It has been well pointed out that "the injunctions of conscience do not run with the stream of our hereditary tendencies, but rather against them."22 That a law of the work and victory of hereditary forces should issue in organizing an endowment for control and repression of hereditary tendencies, seems to involve too much of a contradiction to be accepted. ”

“ We constantly see a man spoken of as Bishop of such a see, and his works advertised as such, before a single ecclesiastical or legal step has been taken to make him so.
(35) See Norman Conquest, iii. 44, 623.
(36) The succession of a grandson, which first took place in England in the case of Richard the Second, marks a distinct stage in the growth of the doctrine of hereditary right. It involves the doctrine of representation, which is a very subtle and technical one, and is not nearly so obvious or so likely to occur in an early state of society as the doctrine of nearness of kin. ”

“ The person to set up is not hereditary, but selected and appointed; and the generation which sets him up, does not live under an hereditary government, but under a government of its own choice. Were the person to set up, and the generation who sets him up, to live for ever, it never could become hereditary succession, and of consequence, hereditary succession can only follow on the death of the first parties. ”

“ That the people of the United States will ever with eyes open revert to the hereditary principle can not be believed by any one who has not persuaded himself that hereditary government is an everlasting ordinance, to which all who have strayed from it are sure to come back in time. ”

“ We may, however, be sure that the principle of hereditary succession must henceforth be limited within certain bounds. The idea of perpetuity, whether of punishment or of reward, is foreign from our age, and will not, certainly, be more acceptable to future ages. ”

“ In this regard there can be no difference between hereditary and elective monarchies; for the heir cannot inherit more than his ancestor enjoyed, or had a right to enjoy, any more than a successor can succeed to it. ”

“ The flocks and herds of the children are the flocks and herds of the father, and the possessions of the parent, which he holds in a representative rather than in a proprietary character, are equally divided at his death among his descendants in the first degree, the eldest son sometimes receiving a double share under the name of birthright, but more generally endowed with no hereditary advantage beyond an honorary precedence. ”

“ Whenever, by the laws of hereditary descent, in their application to health and disease, our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren suffer, we may recognize in it the hand of the great Creator; nor do we doubt, often, the wisdom of such laws nor their ultimate tendency to work out final good. ”

“ While emphasizing the extreme importance of the hereditary principle, especially as connected with the fundamental institution of the family, we should also recognize its tendency to abuse in perpetuating the enormous inequalities of property and condition, many of which originated in a less perfect system of society. ”

“ It is only in the case of the transmission of hereditary rank and of the property of a person dying intestate that more distant relatives are brought into any legal relationship with one another, and then only if there is an absence of nearer relatives. It is only when forced to do so by exceptional circumstances that the law recognises any of the persons to whom the more classificatory of our terms of relationship apply. ”

“ In some cases the hereditary factor is so clearly deficient as to make it natural and justifiable to regard heredity as the cause; in a much larger number of cases there is good reason to think that social conditions are more particularly to blame, and that the original hereditary outfit was fairly good. ”

“ In this hereditary knowledge, and in the proper use of it, (according to the different stations of life in which men subsist in this world,) consists the equality of all mankind in the sight of God, and also in the eye of the law, I mean the common law and rules of natural justice, which are formed upon the self-evident conclusions of human reason, and are the necessary result of the above mentioned hereditary knowledge in man. ”

“ No one can doubt the law of hereditary transmission. Our inherited and acquired characteristics are sure to be transmitted to our descendants. Indeed, so thoroughly does character permeate one's entire being that it might be said of each drop of blood that in its characteristics it is a miniature of the person in whose body it was secreted. Eminent characters do not emanate from degenerate parents; and neither is the reverse true, except as the result of adequate reversionary influences. ”

“ All that reason and justice require is effected, by setting bounds to such advantages, in denying hereditary claims to trusts and power; but evil would be the day, and ominous the symptom, when a people shall deny that any portion of the consideration of the ancestor is due to the descendant. ”

“ Because the idea of hereditary legislators is as inconsistent as that of hereditary judges, or hereditary juries; and as absurd as an hereditary mathematician, or an hereditary wise man; and as ridiculous as an hereditary poet laureate. ”

“ X. A Father, with his sonnes and servants growne into a civill Person by vertue of his paternall jurisdiction, is called a FAMILY. This family, if through multiplying of children, and acquisition of servants, it becomes numerous, insomuch as without casting the uncertain dye of warre, it cannot be subdued, will be termed an Hereditary Kingdome ”

“ The power of perpetuating our property in our families is one of the most valuable and interesting circumstances belonging to it, and that which tends the most to the perpetuation of society itself. It makes our weakness subservient to our virtue; it grafts benevolence even upon avarice. The possessors of family wealth, and of the distinction which attends hereditary possession, (as most concerned in it,) are the natural securities for this transmission. ”

“ The perpetuation of hereditary defect is infinitely worse than murder. Consider, for example, a marriage, sanctioned by church and state, between two persons both having in their blood hereditary feeble-mindedness. ”

“ It is evident that the institution of such castes originally arose from the notion of the great importance of hereditary distinctions possessed by certain families, which it was presumed would always be transmitted by the parents to the children. ”

“ All hereditary government is in its nature tyranny. An heritable crown, or an heritable throne, or by what other fanciful name such things may be called, have no other significant explanation than that mankind are heritable property. To inherit a government, is to inherit the people, as if they were flocks and herds. ”

“ As many families become gradually extinct by hereditary diseases, as by scrofula, consumption, epilepsy, mania, it is often hazardous to marry an heiress, as she is not unfrequently the last of a diseased family. ”

“ In whatever light hereditary succession, as growing out of the will and testament of some former generation, presents itself, it is an absurdity. A cannot make a will to take from B the property of B, and give it to C; yet this is the manner in which (what is called) hereditary succession by law operates. A certain former generation made a will, to take away the rights of the commencing generation, and all future ones, and convey those rights to a third person, who afterwards comes forward, and tells them, in Mr. ”

“ I say, then, that hereditary States, accustomed to the family of their Prince, are maintained with far less difficulty than new States, since all that is required is that the Prince shall not depart from the usages of his ancestors, trusting for the rest to deal with events as they arise. ”

“ It is well known that, even in our day, in many civilized countries the idea of hereditary grades of rank goes so far, that, for example, the aristocracy imagine themselves to be of a nature totally different from that of ordinary citizens, and nobles who commit a disgraceful offence are punished by being expelled from the caste of nobles, and thrust down among the pariahs of “vulgar citizens.” ”

“ But I was right. I think that must be an hereditary quality, for my father says he is scarcely ever wrong. ”

“ But an ungrateful son ought not to obtain an inheritance; and rather than such, we should adopt a stranger. Therefore, since thou hast been ungrateful to thy father in maintaining me contrary to his command, thou shalt never possess my inheritance." The son thus answered his uncle. "No one can be punished for executing what the law commands and compels. Now the law of nature obliges children to assist their parents in necessity, and especially to honour them: therefore, I cannot justly be deprived of the inheritance." ”

“ I said, I regretted I was not the head of a clan; however, though not possessed of such an hereditary advantage, I would always endeavour to make my tenants follow me. ”

“ The law of inheritance for people of distinction differs from that of the kings in the fact that the eldest son inherits by right of primogeniture, and succeeds to all his father’s property, wives and slaves. He generally allows his mother a separate establishment and maintenance and finds employment and maintenance for his father’s other wives in the family residence. ”

“ Inherit we must to some degree; and whatever comes to us by that method must belong to the parent before he is a parent. Traits acquired after parentage are certainly not transmissible, whatever may be the case before. Our inherited constitution, temper, character, tendency, is like an entailed estate. It is in the family, belongs to the family in succession, not to the individual. It is "owned" by the individual in usufruct, but cannot be sold, given away, or otherwise alienated. ”

“ If a man had no legitimate children, he could leave his whole inheritance to his natural children, or to their mother; but if he had lawful children, he could leave only one twelfth to the natural children and their mother. If the father died intestate, without leaving a lawful wife or issue, his natural children and their mother were entitled to one sixth of the succession, and the rest was divided among the lawful heirs. ”

“ My Ancestry Our history begins before we are born. We represent the hereditary influences of our race, and our ancestors virtually live in us. ”

“ And if neither father nor mother in whom these rights are vested, should leave any children, the entire inheritance shall be divided among the other descendants; but they shall not have the power to give to each grandchild more than the third part of the aforesaid property. ”

“ Limitations In Respect Of Succession Outside The Direct Line Of Descent.
The right of succession limited to the great-grandchild of the common ancestor. The Gortyn law quoted above in the previous section goes on:—
v. “If (a man or woman die and) they have no children, the deceased's brothers and brother's children or grandchildren shall have the property. If there are none of these, the deceased's sisters, their children or grandchildren. If there are none of these, to whom it descends of whatever grade they be, they shall inherit the property.” ”

“ Illegitimate children acknowledged by their fathers are 'natural children.' Natural children can take from their father by intestate succession 'to the exclusion only of the State.' They may be bequeathed property by their father only to the extent of either one-third or one-fourth of his estate and then only if their father is not survived by legitimate children or their heirs. ”

“ Sometimes they do not inherit, but transmit a right of inheritance to their male issue. Sometimes they succeed to one kind of property, for the most part movable property, which they probably look a great share in producing by their household labour; for example, in the real Salic law (not in the imaginary code) there is a set of rules of succession which, in my opinion, clearly admit women and their descendants to a share in the inheritance of movable property, but confine land exclusively to males and the descendants of males. ”

“ Again, by the laws and customs of inheritance, the estate of the father descends to the first-born. The younger sons must be adopted into another family, or, failing this, must make their own fortunes independently. ”

“ When the law of inheritance permits, still more when it decrees, the equal division of a father's property amongst all his children, its effects are of two kinds: it is important to distinguish them from each other, although they tend to the same end. ”

“ If his parents were natural born subjects, and capable to take as heirs of the deceased ancestor, it is clear that he could not inherit by descent through them, as they would intercept the title, as nearer heirs. The only cases in which he could inherit, living his parents, are those where the common law has prohibited the parents from taking, although they have inheritable blood. ”