TERM, 1852.] Trustees R. E. Bank vs. Watson & Hubbard. subjected to seizure and sale under any execution upon any judgment, order or decree of a court of record, concludes by declaring the same thing in respect to all real estate, whether patented or not, whereof the defendant or any person for his use was seized in law or equity on the day of the rendition of the judgment, order or decree whereon execution issued, or at any time thereafter. The 79th sec. of the chapter, defines the term "real estate" as used in that act, and declares that it shall be so construed as to include all estate and interest in lands, tenements and hereditaments. A reversion is the return of land to the grantor and his heirs, after the grant is over; or, according to the formal definition in the New York Revised Statutes, it is the residue of an estate left in the grantor or his heirs, or in the heirs of a testator commencing in possession on the determination of a particular estate granted or devised. It necessarily assumes that the original owner has not parted with his whole estate or interest in the land, and therefore if he grants land in tail, or for life, or years, he has an interest in the reversion, because "he hath not departed with his whole estate." The reversion arises by operation of law, and not by deed or will; and it is a vested interest or estate, inasmuch as the person entitled to it has a fixed right of future enjoyment. It is an incorporeal hereditament, and may be conveyed either in whole or in part by grant without livery of seizin. Reversions expectant on the determination of estates for years, are immediate assets in the hands of the heir; but the reversion expectant on the determination of an estate for life is not immediate assets during the continuance of the life estate, and the creditor takes judgment for assets in futuro. If the reversion be expectant on an estate tail, it is not assets during the continuance of the estate tail; and the reason assigned is, that the reversion is of little or no value since it is in the power of the tenant in tail to destroy it when he pleases. But in Kinarton v. Clarke, Lord Hardwicke considered it inaccurate to say that such a reversion was not assets: for there is a possibility of its becoming an estate in possession, and the creditor might take judgment against the heir, on that possibility, for assets quando Trustees R. E. Bank vs. Watson & Hubbard. [JANUARY acciderint, and which would operate whenever the heir obtained seizure of the reversion. In the mean time, as it was admitted, the reversion could not be sold nor the heir compelled to sell it; and when it comes to the possession of the heir he takes it cum onere subject to all leases and covenants made by the tenant in tail while he had the estate. The reversioner, having a vested interest in the reversion, is entitled to his action for an injury done to the inheritance. He is entitled to an action on the case in the nature of waste against a stranger while the estate is in the possession of the tenant. The injury must be of such a permanent nature as to affect the reversionary right." (See 4 Kent's Com. 353, 4 and 5, and the cases there cited.) It appears from this extract, in which reference is made to the English authorities that a reversion expectant on the estate tail could not be sold nor the heir compelled to sell it, and that when it came into possession of the heir he took it cum onere subject to all leases and covenants made by the tenant in tail while he had the estate. We are fully prepared to admit the correctness of the proposition. laid down by Watkins, in his law of descents, and quoted with approbation by Lord Alvanley in the case of Doe v. Hutton, (3 Bos. & Pul. 656,) which is, that "When a reversion or remainder expectant upon an estate of free hold continues in a course of descent, it continually devolves on the death of each particular heir, to the person who can then make himself heir to the donor or purchaser, without any regard to the very heir of the precedent person who succeeded to it by descent, till, when the particular estate is determined, it ultimately vests in possession in him who, at such determination is the right heir of such donor, purchaser or original remainderman." The reason of this, as he stated it, is, that as there was no intermediate person actually seized of such reversion or remainder, no one could be the mean of turning its descent and becoming a new stock or terminus; but such stock must yet be in the donor, purchaser or remainderman, and must so continue if no alienation be made till such estates shall become vested in possession. It is conceded that such was the law in England at the time of the delivery of the TERM, 1852.] Trustees R. E. Bank vs. Watson & Hubbard. opinion in the case of Doe v. Hutton, already referred to, and whether it is still the law here, or whether it has been charged by our act of descents and distributions, we do not deem it material to decide. The fact of a reversionary interest being transmissible or not by the mere force and operation of the law of descents, cannot settle the question here involved. True it is that in case of doubt the principle referred to might throw some light upon it by way of analogy, and inferences of more or less force might be drawn from it, and this is the most that could be derived from that source. This principle of the law in relation to descents as it stood at that time, even admitting it in its fullest extent, could have no application to the question before us, since the current has been turned by the conveyance of the reversioner of all his interest in the estate to Watson, who is a stranger to the old stock or terminus. In respect to Henry Cheatham's power thus to alienate his reversionary interest in the lands to Watson, before the determination of the particular estate, there cannot exist a single doubt. The course of descent as pointed out by the authority already referred to, was upon the express condition that no alienation had been made before the estate became vested in possession. (See Doe v. Hutton, 657.) Indeed it is expressly said in that case, "If a man purchase a reversion only, he is never actually seized at all, and yet his heir would be entitled. In Hale's Mss., cited in the notes to Hargrave and Butler's Co. Litt. 14, as it is said, "if A purchase a reversion expectant on an estate for life and dies without issue, regularly his brother of the half blood shall not be heir to him, because though where there is a mesne seizure he ought to make himself heir to him who is last actually seized, yet when there is not such a mesne seizure, he ought to make himself heir to him in whom it first vests by purchase." According to the authorities therefore, the interest of Cheatham, the reversioner, having passed to, and vested in, Watson by purchase, and that too before the determination of the particular estate, without alienation by Watson, would have descended to his lawful heirs, and that too whether he were living or dead at the time of the determination of the particular Trustees R. E. Bank vs. Watson & Hubbard. [ JANUARY estate. The question here to be decided is whether a reversion expectant on the determination of an estate for life, after a sale by the reversioner, is subject to execution to satisfy a judgment against the purchaser? Is it an estate or interest in lands, tenements, or hereditaments, or was Watson seized of such estate or interest either in law equity? Chancellor Kent, in the 4th volume of his commentaries, at page 354, says, "The reversion arises by operation of law, and not by deed or will, and it is a vested interest or estate, inasmuch as the person entitled to it has a fixed right of future enjoyment. It is an incorporeal hereditament, and may be conveyed either in whole or in part, by grant, without livery of seizin. It is the residue of an estate left in the grantor or his heirs, or in the heirs of a testator, commencing in possession on the determination of a particular estate granted or devised. It necessarily assumes that the original owner has not parted with his whole estate or interest in the land, and therefore if he grants land in tail or for life or years, he has an interest in the reversion, because "he hath not departed with his whole estate." It is clear and incontrovertible that a reversion is a hereditament, and it would be absurd to say that a party could be the sole proprietor of such hereditament, and have a vested interest or estate in the same, and yet neither seized in law or equity. It is readily conceded that neither Henry Cheatham, before the sale to Watson, nor Watson after such sale, was actually seized and possessed of the reversion; but it must be obvious to every one that they were both in their turn seized in contemplation of law. The fee had never passed out of Henry Cheatham until the sale to Watson, and the only disability under which he labored, was a want of power to enjoy the estate itself during the existence of the particular estate. The case of Whitney v. Whitney, 14 Mass. 88, and Benton v. Smith et al., 13 Peters 464, are in point, and indeed may be admitted as conclusive of the question. In the latter case, the Supreme Court of the United States said, "Now in Comyn's Digest, title Grant, E. 2, it is said that by grant of all lands and tenements a reversion passes. In the same book, title Estate, B. 12, TERM, 1852.] Trustees R. E. Bank vs. Watson & Hubbard. So, in 2 it is said, if a man grant the land itself, the reversion passes. So, in Moore's Reports 36, a reversion falls within the terms, land and tenements. But the party must have been seized at the time of obtaining the judgment, or afterwards. Now let us see what is meant by the seizure spoken of in the statute. And the authorities are clear, that it is not confined to actual corporeal possession. In Gilbert on Executions, pages 38-39, it is said that the judgment binds not only the lands and tenements of which the defendant is actually seized, but also the reversions or leases for lives as well as for years; for although the words of the elegit are, that without delay you cause to be delivered a moiety of all the lands and tenements of which the aforesaid B. was seized &c., yet the intent of the writ extends to whatever lands and tenements were actually vested in the defendant; because the statute is a moiety of the land, which extends to reversions which are comprised under the name lands, since they are lands returning to the defendant when the particular estate ceases. Williams' Land 68, it is said, judgment binds not only lands of which defendant is actually seized, but also reversions or leases for lives or years; and therefore a moiety of a reversion may be extended, and plaintiff will have a moiety of the rent. So, in Chitty on Descents 338, it is said, that if judgment be had in the debtor's life time, it will bind the property, though no execution be taken out till the property descends to others. Nay, in case of a judgment, it is said to bind, even where it is against a person from whom the estate does not immediately descend, as if it were against a remainderman or reversioner, whereas the contrary would be the case of a bond on which no judgment had been rendered in the debtor's life time, who stood in the same relation. The author last cited, in page 54, quoting Watkins on Descents 40, 41, speaking of the subject of seizin of reversions, remarks that the confusion seems to have been created by the different meanings which have been attached to the word "seizin," by being used in a general sense when it should properly have been confined in its acceptation; or by being confined when it should have been taken in a general sense. And in pages 53, |