Also known as: legal personality · legal persons · personhood · corporate personhood · juridical personality
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
The status of being recognized by law as capable of holding rights and duties. A legal person may enter contracts, own property, sue and be sued, and bear obligations independently of any natural individual.
Lola Langley and her husband created embryos through in vitro fertilization and stored them at a clinic under a cryopreservation agreement that labeled the embryos as their property. After separation Lola demanded removal and transfer, but the clinic refused citing a later research contract. The court treated the embryos as property subject to the couple's disposition rights rather than as legal persons capable of independent claims.
Linden Bank financed a development project that threatened a wilderness area. An environmental group sued on behalf of the affected land itself, asserting that the land possessed legal personhood sufficient to support standing. The court rejected the claim because inanimate objects lack the juridical personality required to hold enforceable rights in federal court.
Select any source to read its text and confirm it supports the definition.
Yes. Contract formation requires at least two parties capable of holding rights and duties. A course, family account, or other label that is not a recognized individual or entity cannot serve as a promisor or promisee.
Supporting sources
Yes. Upon proper formation a limited partnership is an entity distinct from its partners and may own property, enter contracts, and incur liabilities in its own name.
Supporting sources
No. In the contractual context of cryopreservation agreements, frozen embryos are characterized as property of the progenitors rather than as legal persons capable of independent rights.
Supporting sources
No. A decedent lacks juridical personality, so a donative transfer cannot be made to a person who is deceased.
Supporting sources
…be more properly labeled as Mineral King v. Morton . Inanimate objects are sometimes parties in litigation. A ship has a legal personality, a fiction found useful for maritime purposes.[^maj-18] The corporation sole—a creature of ecclesiastical law—is an acceptable adversary and large fortunes ride on its cases.[^maj-19] The…