Also known as: legal successions · succession · intestate succession
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
Transfer of a decedent's property to heirs according to statutory rules of intestate succession rather than by will. The shares are determined by applying the law that would govern if the designated ancestor had died intestate owning the property.
Layla Lane left a trust providing a class gift of farmland to her descendants without specifying shares. When the interest vested, Lucia Lopez and Luke Latham were the only living descendants. The property passed to them in the proportions they would have received if Layla had died intestate at that moment.
Liam Larson died without a will owning a coastal cottage. Lillian Locke, his only surviving child, received title by operation of law. No deed from Liam was required for the transfer to take effect.
Lattice Systems was formed under the Model Business Corporation Act. The articles contained no contrary provision, so the corporation acquired perpetual duration and succession in its corporate name, allowing it to hold and transfer property indefinitely without dissolution upon any member's death.
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Lucy Liu, domiciled in State B, inherited land located in State A from her aunt. A court in State C applied the totality of State A's law, including its choice-of-law rules, to determine the validity and effect of the legal succession to the immovable.
Linden Bank received a written instruction to pay a sum to Lighthouse Shipping or, if that company no longer existed, to its legal successors. Because the instruction named alternative payees rather than successive ones, the instrument qualified as an order under the statute.
After Marco's death without a will, Lena sought a share of the estate for her son Diego on the basis of DNA evidence alone. The court required formal lifetime paternity establishment under state intestacy rules before recognizing Diego's claim through legal succession.
Legal succession occurs by operation of intestacy statutes when a person dies without a valid will. Testamentary succession occurs when a will validly directs the distribution of property. The former applies default statutory shares. The latter follows the testator's expressed intent.
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No. Title passes automatically by operation of law under the applicable intestacy statute. A fiduciary may later execute a deed only to perfect record title.
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When the instrument creating the class gift to descendants or heirs does not specify distribution shares, the property is divided among living class members according to the intestacy statute that would apply if the designated ancestor had died owning the property at the time of vesting.
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Yes. Under the Model Business Corporation Act, every corporation has perpetual duration and succession in its corporate name unless the articles provide otherwise.
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…assert that its novel conclusion reflects a changing consensus among state courts, see Mapp v. Ohio , 367 U. S. 643, or that a succession of cases had steadily eroded the old rule and proved it unworkable, see Gideon v. Wainwright , 372 U. S. 335. Rather than asserting new knowledge, the Court concedes that it cannot truly…