Legal Term: LIMITATION

Definition: estates. When an estate is so expressly confined and limited by the words of its creation, that it cannot endure for a longer time than till the contingency shall happen, upon which the estate is to fail, this is denom-inated a limitation; as, when land is granted to a man while he continues unmarried, or until the rents and profits shall have made a certain sum, and the like; in these cases the estate is limited, that is, it does not go beyond the happening of the contingency. 2 Bl. Com. 155; 10 Co. 41; Bac. Ab. Conditions, H; Co. Litt. 236 b; 4 Kent. Com. 121; Tho. Co. Litt. Index, h. t.; 10 Vin. Ab. 218; 1 Vern. 483, n. 4; Ves. Jr. 718.

2. There is a difference between a limitation and a condition. When a thing is given until an event shall arrive, this is called a limitation; but when it is given generally, and the gift is to be defeated upon the happening of an uncertain event, then the gift is conditional. For example, when a man gives a legacy to his wife, while, or as long as, she shall remain his widow, or until she shall marry, the estate is given to her only for the time of her widowhood and, on her marriage, her right to it determines. Bac. Ab. Conditions, H. But if, instead of giving the legacy to the wife, as above mentioned, the gift had been to her generally with a proviso, or on condition that she should not marry, or that if she married she should forfeit her legacy, this would be a condition, and such condition being in restraint of marriage, would be void.

Return to the Legalnut.com Law Dictionary