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on the other hand, is a right which may be exercised against the whole world, and not against certain persons only. Among rights in rem are the rights to personal safety and freedom, to reputation, to the society and limited control of one's family and employes, and what may be called proprietary or property rights, meaning thereby rights as to the possession, use, or disposition of particular things.1

There are certain groups of rights which, by analogy to things of a physical nature, are treated as the subjects of proprietary rights; but excluding these for future consideration,2 we can say that the things which are the subjects of proprietary rights may belong to either of two classes,—that is, they may consist (1) of land or of things so annexed thereto as to be considered a part of the land; (2) of articles of a movable character, not annexed to land, or not annexed thereto in such a way as, in the view of the law, to be part thereof. This classification of the objects of enjoyment, based as it is on an essential difference in their character, was recognized in Roman law and in systems derived therefrom; but in English law it has at tained a peculiar importance.3

Speaking generally, though not with entire accuracy, proprietary rights in the class of things first mentioned--that is, in land and things annexed thereto constitute what is called "real property," while rights in movable things constitute "personal property." The want of absolute correspondence between the two classes of rights and objects of rights arises chiefly from the fact that there are certain property interests in lands which are treated as personal property, they being what are hereafter considered as "es

'Holland's Jurisprudence, c. 9, III., c. 11; Digby, Hist. Real Prop. 297 (appendix to Fart I.).

* See post, § 5, "Incorporeal Things Real."

See 1 Leake, 3; Holland's Jurisprudence, 91 Digby, Hist Real Prop. 301; Maine's Ancient Law (3d Am. Ed.) 265, 274.

tates less than freehold." These, owing to their identification with personal property, have received the name of "chattels real," and sometimes of "leasehold" estates or interests, they being generally created by an instrument called a "lease." Furthermore, the class of rights called "liens," even when they concern land, and not movable things, are to be regarded as personal rather than real property."

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2. The terms "real" and "personal."

The terms "real property" and "personal property," now so generally used, are of modern origin, going back apparently to about the middle of the seventeenth century. They are derived from the names given to different classes of actions,-"real actions" and "personal actions." Real actions were those in which one who had been deprived of freehold interests in land, or of those "incorporeal" things which we shall hereafter consider as assimilated to land by the English law, could obtain restitution of the very property itself; while personal actions were those to which one deprived of goods or chattels was compelled to resort, and in which he could not insist upon recovery of the very property itself, but might, at the option of the defendant, be compelled to take the pecuniary value of the property. The two classes of action were accordingly said to "sound in the realty or personalty," respectively."

See post, § 18.

See post, § 3.

• Williams, Real Prop. (18th Ed.) 26, note.

Litt. §§ 492, 500; Co. Litt. 118b, 285a, 288b. This distinction between the two classes of actions originated with Bracton, who appropriated the terms of Roman law, "actio in rem" and "actio in personam" (see 2 Pollock & Maitland, Hist. Eng. Law, 173), on the theory that the former phrase properly designated an action in which the thing itself could be recovered, and the latter an action in which the final recourse was against the person only. These

The terms "real" and "personal" were also applied to the things which were the subjects of actions; those things which were recoverable specifically being termed "things real," while those things not so recoverable, but for the wrongful withholding of which damages only could be recovered, were termed "things personal."

3. Classification of rights in land.

The most important of the proprietary rights over land are those to which we commonly apply the term "ownership," involving, within limitations more or less wide, the idea of rights in some particular person or persons (the owner or owners) to use the land according to his or their pleasure, without accountability to others. Accordingly we devote Part II. of this work to the subject of "The ownership of land," using the word "ownership" without reference to the greater or less duration of the rights involved."

A person may be given power to transfer or dispose of land even in derogation of rights of ownership in another. "Rights to dispose of land," thus existing independently of ownership, are treated in Part III. of this work.

terms were afterwards changed into the forms actio realis and actio personalis, and these latter were translated as above. The distinction between "actiones in rem" and "in personam" in Roman law was, however, not based on the character of the relief granted, but purely on the character of the rights involved. See, on this subject, the learned article by Mr. T. Cyprian Williams in 4 Law Quart. Rev. 394, on which this section is based.

Co. Litt. 118b; 1 Leake, 8; 4 Law Quart. Rev. 394.

• The term "ownership of land,” here used to designate what might perhaps be more exactly designated by the expression "ownership of estates in land," is taken from Mr. Digby's valuable work. He says (page 303, note 3): "I do not forget that in common parlance we distinguish between tenant for years and the freeholder by saying that the former has the possession or occupation of the land, and that the latter only is the owner. But it is impossible to attempt to invest any word in common use with a technical

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