Crane-Property Outline-Fall 2008
Acquisition of Property:
Property refers not to things, but to rights concerning things.
Your right to control → is the essence of property.
Rights of Property:
Possess, Use, Exclude, Transfer, Profit, etc.
Acquisition: a way in which property is acquired.
Most common: some sort of voluntary transfer – like gift, bequest or purchase
Very concept of ownership illustrated by acquiring possession.
Possession: includes not only physical custody of something – but also possession of things not in ones immediate physical custody (Constructive Possession)
Property:
Concept is abstract – it is the relationship among people with respect to things
Consists of a bundle of rights
Right to control is the essence of property.
Possession:
Ownership does not equal control
Possession is about control
Ownership = Constructive Possession, but not necessarily actual possession.
A holding or seizing of personal property – with or without a claim of ownership
An intent to possess on the part of the possessor and his or her actual seizure or holding of the property.
Ferae Naturae:
Intuitiveness to resist capture and when captured will still continue to seek escape.
Wild by nature.
We are ferae naturae – we are unwound and we will seek our freedom.
Ratione Soli:
“By reason of the soil”
A previously unowned thing is owned by the person who owns the land on which the thing is located at the present time
Ownership of everything on your land, over it, under it, etc.
Anything on your land you can claim as yours.
Locke’s Labor Theory:
Every man has property in his own person
Goes out of state of nature – and through labor
Anything you add your labor to and make new – it is yours
Everyone owns themselves and have a property interest in themselves
When you take raw material – and mix it with your labor (which you own) you make that object your own.
Accession:
Take something out of nature and mix it with your labor then it becomes yours – even by taking property of another as long as you mix it with your labor, then by this law it becomes your property – if changed in a significant way.
Similar to Locke’s Theory of Labor just that this applies more to something owned by another.
Hypo:
Artist draws on your wall and someone offers him a million dollars for it – who owns it?
Painter: claims that by mixing his talent he has created a new value for the wall and it should be his
Homeowner: would say thanks for giving me a million dollar gift, you put it on my wall and I have a superior right to it.
Acquisition by Capture:
Pierson v. Post (NY 1805)
D was hunting and following a fox. P found the fox and killed it well-knowing that the D was in pursuit. P won the case and retained the fox.
Property in wild animals is only acquired through occupancy and pursuit alone does not constitute occupancy or vest any right in the pursuer.
The animal must be ferae naturae and it must have it’s natural liberty. To capture it, a person must take away that natural liberty.
If in hot pursuit, you have superior title.
Judicial Hunch: no one will want to hunt if someone can take the game. Technology will vitiate this hunch.
Ghen v. Rich (Mass. 1881)
P shot and killed a whale, leaving it to be collected the next day. The D found the whale and sold it against tradition to return it to the person who had shot it. P sues to get the price of the whale. P won the case for the price of the whale.
When all that is practicable in order to secure a wild animal, it becomes the property of the securer who has thus exercised sufficient control and dominion over the animal.
Marks of appropriation show ownership.
Keeble v. Hickeringill (Queen’s Bench, 1707)
P was using his duck pond while his D neighbor fired musket shots and drove the ducks away on two separate occasions. P is suing.
When a person maliciously interferes with another’s use of his own property a cause of actions will lie. One can interfere in a competitive nature and by using the same employment. No action will then lie.
P had constructive possession of the ducks. (pretend possession)
Actual possession: you have physical manucapture on the object.
Ratione Soli: own anything in, on, or above the soil
HYPOS:
T captures wild animal on O’s land and takes it to his property where he puts it in a cage. T1 trespasses on T’s land and steals the animal. T sues T1 for the return of the animal. T1 points out that T had no right in the animal. What result
g published by them. P claims that news is something that cannot be owned and denies wrongdoing.
There is common property in news, but there is ownership in the story as written.
When the news hits the light of day it becomes communal property.
The selling of news gathered by another source labeled as your own is unfair competition in trade.
Doctrine of Accession applies to the news: putting your effort into raw facts.
HYPO:
Can a weekly or monthly magazine copy AP’s news and not be held liable?
Yes they can. They are in a different industry so this means that they are not in competition with each other.
Since they are in different industries they do not impinge each other.
Publication for profit of news obtained from other news gathering enterprises is a misappropriation of a property right.
Cheney Brothers v. Doris Silk Corp. (US Ct. App. 1930)
P claimed that the D copied a popular design of silk from the P and have undercut the P’s prices.
D’s claim that they have duplicated the design, but did so in an unintentional manner.
To prevent any imitation of something is to set up a monopoly.
If not competing in the same market, then it does not matter.
If a person cannot obtain a patent or copyright on its product, it cannot recover for the copying of it by others.
Patents:
Patents are granted for novel, useful, and non-obvious processes or products.
Last for 20 years from the start of the application, no renewable.
When they expire, they may be exploited by anyone.
Copyrights:
Protect the expression of ideas in books, articles, music, artistic works, and so on.
Protection begins as soon as the work is set down in a tangible medium.
Last until 70 years after the death of the creator, others may make “fair use”.
