Also known as: jus personarum · jura in personam · law of persons · rights of persons
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
Rights attaching to individuals in their personal capacity. These rights arise from personal status or relationships and may be asserted against specific parties or in connection with particular transactions.
Jorge Juarez serves as trustee of a family trust holding investment property. He sells a parcel to a company he controls at below-market value. Beneficiary Jeanette Jensen learns of the sale and sues to void the transaction. The court permits her to rescind because the deal implicates rights of persons entitled to the trustee's undivided loyalty.
Jarvis Aviation LLC holds assets valued at $2.1 million with liabilities of $900,000. Members vote to distribute $1.4 million while a preferred member holds a $1.3 million liquidation preference. After the payout the remaining assets fall short of liabilities plus the preference. The preferred member blocks the distribution to protect superior rights of persons in dissolution.
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Jefferson Trust LP plans a $600,000 cash distribution. Its balance sheet shows assets of $2.4 million and liabilities of $800,000. A senior limited partner holds a $1.5 million preferential claim on liquidation. The proposed distribution would leave assets below liabilities plus the preference. The senior partner obtains an injunction preserving rights of persons with priority.
Jaffe Securities LLP authorizes a large cash payout to its partners. After the distribution remaining assets would fall below liabilities plus the liquidation preferences of certain investor partners. Those investors sue to stop the payment. The court enforces the statutory test that safeguards rights of persons holding superior claims in a hypothetical winding up.
A person born into slavery claims status as a citizen entitled to sue in federal court. The court denies the claim on the ground that the individual lacks the personal rights of citizens under the Constitution. The decision turns on whether the claimant possesses jura personarum sufficient to invoke federal jurisdiction.
Congress enacts a statute protecting language-minority voters from discriminatory literacy tests. A state challenges the law as exceeding federal power. The Court upholds the statute because it enforces rights of persons to equal political participation under the Fourteenth Amendment.
Jura personarum concern rights that attach to individuals because of their personal status or relationships. Jura rerum concern rights in tangible or intangible things. The distinction appears in historical classifications separating personal rights from property rights.
A partnership may rely on statements prepared under reasonable accounting principles or on a fair valuation that is reasonable under the circumstances. Either method protects the jura personarum of partners holding superior preferential rights by ensuring assets cover liabilities plus those preferences after the distribution.
A transaction affected by a conflict between fiduciary and personal interests is voidable by an affected beneficiary. The rule safeguards the jura personarum of trust beneficiaries by allowing them to unwind deals that compromise the trustee's duty of loyalty.
…(dissenting opinion). Unheeded then, those words now are understood to state a commitment to the law's neutrality where the rights of persons are at stake. The Equal Protection Clause enforces this principle and today requires us to hold invalid a provision of Colorado's Constitution. I The enactment challenged in this…