Estoppel is a judicial device in common law legal systems whereby a court may prevent or "estop" a person from making assertions or from going back on his or her word; the person being sanctioned is "estopped". Estoppel may prevent someone from bringing a particular claim. Legal doctrines of estoppel are based in both common law and equity. It is also a concept in international law. Types of estoppel. There are many different types of estoppel which can arise, but the common thread between them ...
May 17, 2022•12 min•Season 19Ep. 36
Legal malpractice is the term for negligence, breach of fiduciary duty, or breach of contract by a lawyer during the provision of legal services that causes harm to a client. Examples. A common example of legal malpractice involves the lawyer missing a deadline for filing a paper with the court or serving a paper on another party, where that error is fatal to the client's case or causes the client to spend more money to resolve the case than would otherwise have been required. For example, a law...
May 16, 2022•9 min•Season 17Ep. 32
In law, standing or locus standi is a condition that a party seeking a legal remedy must show they have, by demonstrating to the court, sufficient connection to and harm from the law or action challenged to support that party's participation in the case. A party has standing in the following situations: The party is directly subject to an adverse effect by the statute or action in question, and the harm suffered will continue unless the court grants relief in the form of damages or a finding tha...
May 13, 2022•18 min•Season 16Ep. 37
Mortgages in the United States. The Three Theories of Mortgages. There are three legal theories pertaining to mortgages: Title Theory, Lien Theory, and Intermediate Theory. These three theories pertain particularly to the operation of mortgages, and so provide the key to understanding the differences which exist in the operation of mortgages across jurisdictions. Title Theory. Title theory is "the idea that a mortgage transfers legal title of the mortgaged property from the mortgagor to the mort...
May 12, 2022•11 min•Season 15Ep. 30
The rule of felony murder is a legal doctrine in some common law jurisdictions that broadens the crime of murder: when an offender kills (regardless of intent to kill) in the commission of a dangerous or enumerated crime (called a felony in some jurisdictions), the offender, and also the offender's accomplices or co-conspirators, may be found guilty of murder. The concept of felony murder originates in the rule of transferred intent, which is older than the limit of legal memory. In its original...
May 11, 2022•11 min•Season 17Ep. 30
Penal damages are liquidated damages which exceed reasonable compensatory damages, making them invalid under common law. While liquidated damage clauses set a pre-agreed value on the expected loss to one party if the other party were to breach the contract, penal damages go further and seek to penalise the breaching party beyond the reasonable losses from the breach. Many clauses which are found to be penal are expressed as liquidated damages clauses but have been seen by courts as excessive and...
May 10, 2022•5 min•Season 19Ep. 35
Negligent entrustment is a cause of action in United States tort law which arises where one party ("the entrustor") is held liable for negligence because they negligently provided another party ("the entrustee") with a dangerous instrumentality, and the entrusted party caused injury to a third party with that instrumentality. The cause of action most frequently arises where one person allows another to drive their automobile. General principles. One of the earliest reported cases under this caus...
May 09, 2022•7 min•Season 17Ep. 31
Uniformity Clause. The final phrase of the Taxing and Spending Clause stipulates: but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States. Here, the requirement is that taxes must be geographically uniform throughout the United States. This means taxes affected by this provision must function "with the same force and effect in every place where the subject of it is found." However, this clause does not require revenues raised by the tax from each state be equal. Justice...
May 06, 2022•12 min•Season 16Ep. 36
A mortgage is a legal instrument of the common law which is used to create a security interest in real property held by a lender as a security for a debt, usually a mortgage loan. The corresponding term in civil law jurisdictions is hypothec. A mortgage in itself is not a debt, it is the lender's security for a debt. It is a transfer of an interest in land (or the equivalent) from the owner to the mortgage lender, on the condition that this interest will be returned to the owner when the terms o...
May 05, 2022•16 min•Season 15Ep. 29
Victim. All jurisdictions require that the victim be a natural person; that is, a human being who was still alive before being murdered. In other words, under the law one cannot murder a corpse, a corporation, a non-human animal, or any other non-human organism such as a plant or bacterium. California's murder statute, penal code section 187, expressly mentioned a fetus as being capable of being killed, and was interpreted by the Supreme Court of California in 1994 as not requiring any proof of ...
May 04, 2022•16 min•Season 17Ep. 29
Liquidated damages, also referred to as liquidated and ascertained damages (LADs), are damages whose amount the parties designate during the formation of a contract for the injured party to collect as compensation upon a specific breach (for example, late performance). This is most applicable where the damages are intangible, such as a failure by the contractor on a public project to fulfill minority business subcontracting quotas. An average of the likely costs which may be incurred in dealing ...
May 03, 2022•15 min•Season 19Ep. 34
The tort of negligent infliction of emotional distress (NIED) is a controversial cause of action, which is available in nearly all U.S. states but is severely constrained and limited in the majority of them. The underlying concept is that one has a legal duty to use reasonable care to avoid causing emotional distress to another individual. If one fails in this duty and unreasonably causes emotional distress to another person, that actor will be liable for monetary damages to the injured individu...
May 02, 2022•13 min•Season 17Ep. 30
General Welfare Clause to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States; Of all the limitations upon the power to tax and spend, the General Welfare Clause appears to have achieved notoriety as one of the most contentious. The dispute over the clause arises from two distinct disagreements. The first concerns whether the General Welfare Clause grants an independent spending power or is a restriction upon the taxing power. The second disagreement pertain...
Apr 29, 2022•10 min•Season 16Ep. 35
Property Deeds registration is a land management system whereby all important instruments which relate to the common law title to parcels of land are registered on a government-maintained register, to facilitate the transfer of title. The system has been used in some common law jurisdictions and continues to be used in some jurisdictions, including most of the United States. It is being replaced by Torrens systems in many jurisdictions. Australia, Ireland as well as most Canadian provinces have ...
Apr 28, 2022•9 min•Season 15Ep. 28
Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or valid excuse, especially the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. This state of mind may, depending upon the jurisdiction, distinguish murder from other forms of unlawful homicide, such as manslaughter. Manslaughter is killing committed in the absence of malice, brought about by reasonable provocation, or diminished capacity. Involuntary manslaughter, where it is recognized, is a killing that lacks al...
Apr 27, 2022•12 min•Season 17Ep. 28
Specific performance is an equitable remedy in the law of contract, whereby a court issues an order requiring a party to perform a specific act, such as to complete performance of the contract. It is typically available in the sale of land law, but otherwise is not generally available if damages are an appropriate alternative. Specific performance is almost never available for contracts of personal service, although performance may also be ensured through the threat of proceedings for contempt o...
Apr 26, 2022•7 min•Season 19Ep. 33
Negligence (Latin, negligentia) is a failure to exercise appropriate and/or ethical ruled care expected to be exercised amongst specified circumstances. The area of tort law known as negligence involves harm caused by failing to act as a form of carelessness possibly with extenuating circumstances. The core concept of negligence is that people should exercise reasonable care in their actions, by taking account of the potential harm that they might foreseeably cause to other people or property. S...
Apr 25, 2022•13 min•Season 17Ep. 29
The Taxing and Spending Clause (which contains provisions known as the General Welfare Clause and the Uniformity Clause), Article 1, Section 8, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution, grants the federal government of the United States its power of taxation. While authorizing Congress to levy taxes, this clause permits the levying of taxes for two purposes only: to pay the debts of the United States, and to provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States. Taken togethe...
Apr 22, 2022•16 min•Season 16Ep. 34
Torrens title is a land registration and land transfer system, in which a state creates and maintains a register of land holdings, which serves as the conclusive evidence (termed "indefeasibility") of title of the person recorded on the register as the proprietor (owner), and of all other interests recorded on the register. Ownership of land is transferred by registration of a transfer of title, instead of by the use of deeds. The Registrar provides a Certificate of Title to the new proprietor, ...
Apr 21, 2022•14 min•Season 15Ep. 27
Corporate manslaughter is a crime in several jurisdictions, including England and Wales and Hong Kong. It enables a corporation to be punished and censured for culpable conduct that leads to a person's death. This extends beyond any compensation that might be awarded in civil litigation or any criminal prosecution of an individual (including an employee or contractor). The Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 came into effect in the UK on 6 April 2008. Mayhem is a common law cr...
Apr 20, 2022•9 min•Season 17Ep. 28
A legal remedy, also referred to as judicial relief or a judicial remedy, is the means with which a court of law, usually in the exercise of civil law jurisdiction, enforces a right, imposes a penalty, or makes another court order to impose its will in order to compensate for the harm of a wrongful act inflicted upon an individual. In common law jurisdictions and mixed civil-common law jurisdictions, the law of remedies distinguishes between a legal remedy (e.g. a specific amount of monetary dam...
Apr 19, 2022•15 min•Season 19Ep. 32
Breach of promise is a common law tort, abolished in many jurisdictions. It was also called breach of contract to marry, and the remedy awarded was known as heart balm. From at least the Middle Ages until the early 20th century, a man's promise of engagement to marry a woman was considered, in many jurisdictions, a legally binding contract. If the man were to subsequently change his mind, he would be said to be in "breach" of this promise and subject to litigation for damages. The converse of th...
Apr 18, 2022•11 min•Season 17Ep. 28
Development of the modern income tax. Congress re-adopted the income tax in 1913, levying a 1% tax on net personal incomes above $3,000, with a 6% surtax on incomes above $500,000. By 1918, the top rate of the income tax was increased to 77% (on income over $1,000,000) to finance World War I. The top marginal tax rate was reduced to 58% in 1922, to 25% in 1925, and finally to 24% in 1929. In 1932 the top marginal tax rate was increased to 63% during the Great Depression and steadily increased. D...
Apr 15, 2022•18 min•Season 16Ep. 33
In law, conveyancing is the transfer of legal title to (of) real property from one person to another, or the granting of an encumbrance such as a mortgage or a lien. A typical conveyancing transaction has two major phases: the exchange of contracts (when equitable interests are created) and completion (also called settlement, when legal title passes and equitable rights merge with the legal title). The sale of land is governed by the laws and practices of the jurisdiction in which the land is lo...
Apr 14, 2022•11 min•Season 15Ep. 26
Manslaughter is a common law legal term for homicide considered by law as less culpable than murder. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is sometimes said to have first been made by the ancient Athenian lawmaker Draco in the 7th century BC. The definition of manslaughter differs among legal jurisdictions. Types. Voluntary. In voluntary manslaughter, the offender had intent to kill or seriously harm, but acted "in the moment" under circumstances that could cause a reasonable person to...
Apr 13, 2022•10 min•Season 17Ep. 27
In legal theory, particularly in law and economics, efficient breach is a voluntary breach of contract and payment of damages by a party who concludes that they would incur greater economic loss by performing under the contract. Development of the theory. The theory of efficient breach seeks to explain the common law's preference for expectation damages for breach of contract, as distinguished from specific performance, reliance damages, or punitive damages. According to Black's Law Dictionary, ...
Apr 12, 2022•8 min•Season 19Ep. 31
The tort of seduction was a civil wrong or tort in common law legal systems, and still exists in some jurisdictions. Originally, it allowed an unmarried woman's father - or other person employing her services - to sue for the loss of these services, when she became pregnant and could no longer perform them. Over time, the tort was altered, so that instead, it would be used by an unmarried woman to sue on the grounds of seduction to obtain damages from her seducer, if her consent to sex was based...
Apr 11, 2022•7 min•Season 17Ep. 27
The history of taxation in the United States begins with the colonial protest against British taxation policy in the 1760s, leading to the American Revolution. The independent nation collected taxes on imports ("tariffs"), whiskey, and (for a while) on glass windows. States and localities collected poll taxes on voters and property taxes on land and commercial buildings. In addition, there were the state and federal excise taxes. State and federal inheritance taxes began after 1900, while the st...
Apr 08, 2022•18 min•Season 16Ep. 32
Real estate is property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this (also) an item of real property, (more generally) buildings or housing in general. Real estate is different from personal property, which is not permanently attached to the land, such as vehicles, boats, jewelry, furniture, tools and the rolling stock of a farm. Residential real estate. Residential rea...
Apr 07, 2022•17 min•Season 15Ep. 25
Intimidation (also called cowing) is intentional behavior that would cause a person of reasonable apprehension to fear injury or harm. It is not necessary to prove that the behavior caused the victim to experience terror or panic. Threat, criminal threatening (or threatening behavior) is the crime of intentionally or knowingly putting another person in fear of bodily injury. "Threat of harm generally involves a perception of injury...physical or mental damage...act or instance of injury, or a ma...
Apr 06, 2022•17 min•Season 17Ep. 26
