DISAGREEMENT

6 definitions found across Law Mind sources

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DISAGREEMENTAuthored
The Law Mind • 755 words
Definition
1. In real property law: The refusal by a grantee, lessee, or other intended recipient to accept an estate, lease, or other interest conveyed or granted to them. A disagreement in this sense operates to annul a transaction that had legal existence before the refusal. Because no estate can be vested in a person against their will, the law implies agreement to a conveyance until the contrary is shown — making disagreement the mechanism by which that implication is rebutted and the transaction undone. 2. In procedural and adjudicatory contexts: A difference of opinion or want of concurrence among decision-makers — most commonly among jurors (producing a hung jury), among judges of a multi-member court, or among arbitrators. In this sense, disagreement is less a formal legal act than a legal condition with procedural consequences.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): An argument or debate; a condition of not agreeing or concurring. Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): A state of being at variance; dissimilitude; diversity; difference of opinion or sentiment; a falling out or controversy. The ordinary meaning of disagreement is broad and informal — any conflict of views between parties. The property-law sense is narrower and more technical: it is not a dispute between parties but a unilateral legal act by the recipient of a grant, with the specific effect of voiding an estate that would otherwise vest. A researcher encountering "disagreement" in a conveyancing context should not read it as a synonym for dispute or conflict.
Common Confusion
The two legal meanings pull in opposite directions and can produce misreading when context is thin. The property sense (Definition 1) describes an individual's refusal to accept — a unilateral act dissolving a transaction. The procedural sense (Definition 2) describes a collective failure to reach consensus — a condition, not an act. Older sources, including Black's 1st edition, may open with the property definition and treat the procedural sense as secondary, which can mislead researchers who scan only the opening lines of an entry.
Why It Matters in Research
The property-law meaning of disagreement is largely obsolete in modern practice but appears with regularity in historical deed records, equity pleadings, and property treatises through the nineteenth century. Researchers working with pre-twentieth-century conveyancing materials should treat "disagreement" as a term of art signaling the voidance of a grant, not a dispute between grantor and grantee. The procedural meaning — disagreement among jurors or arbitrators — has generated its own body of case law and appears in insurance contracts, arbitration clauses, and procedural rules. Historical insurance cases in particular used "disagreement" as a trigger for arbitration or appraisal procedures; the Black's 2nd edition entry cites cases from Texas, New Jersey, and Missouri in this context, reflecting how frequently the term appeared in late-nineteenth-century commercial and insurance litigation. Researchers should also note that the implied-agreement doctrine embedded in Definition 1 connects to the broader principle that equity will not force an estate upon an unwilling recipient — a principle with consequences for gifts, devises, and disclaimer doctrine. The modern law of disclaimer (now largely codified) is the doctrinal descendant of common-law disagreement in this sense, though the vocabulary has shifted almost entirely away from the older term.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's 1st edition and Rapalje & Lawrence are in close agreement on the property definition, using nearly identical language and the same conceptual structure: the implied-agreement principle as the foundation, disagreement as its negation. Both treat this as the primary legal meaning. Black's 2nd edition meaningfully expands the entry by elevating the procedural meaning to co-equal status, opening with it and supporting it with case citations. This editorial shift likely reflects the increasing prominence of jury-deadlock and arbitration-disagreement questions in American litigation by the early twentieth century. What neither edition fully develops is the relationship between common-law disagreement and the emerging statutory law of disclaimer. By the time Black's 2nd edition was published, courts and legislatures were beginning to formalize disclaimer procedures in ways that would eventually displace the older common-law vocabulary. Historical dictionaries treat disagreement as a property concept without signaling this transition, which can leave researchers unaware that modern disclaimer doctrine is the functional successor.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Conveyance; Disclaimer (Property); Hung Jury; Arbitration.
Related Terms
Agreement — Disclaimer — Acceptance (of a grant) — Renunciation — Hung Jury — Deadlock — Dissent — Vesting — Conveyance — Arbitration (disagreement clause)
DISAGREEMENTmain
Black's Law Dictionary • 1891
The refusal by a grantee, lessee, etc., to accept an estate, lease, etc., made to him; the annulling of a thing that had essence before. No estate can be vested in a person against his will. Conse- quently no one can become a grantee, etc., without his agreement. The law implies
DISAGREEMENTmain
Rapalje & Lawrence • 1888
- The refusal by a grantee, lessee, &c., to accept an estate, lease, 1. To discharge a right or obligation is &c., made to him; the annulling of a thing that to deprive it of its binding force, and to had essence before. No estate can be vested in a person against his will, consequently no one can become a grantee, &c., without his agreement: the law implies such an agreement until the contrary is shown, but his disagreement renders the grant, &c., inoperative. If an infant purchase an estate, he may, on coming to full age, disagree thereto; and if he do not agree thereto, his heirs, after his death, may waive it. If a person of unsound mind purchase an estate, he cannot afterwards disagree thereto himself; but if he does not recover, or after recovery dies without agreement, his heir may disagree to it. If a feme covert purchase an estate, her husband may disagree thereto; and if he neither agrees nor disagrees, the purchase is good during the coverture, but after his death, notwithstanddischarge a person is to release him from an obligation; thus, payment discharges a debt, and in the case of a guaranty, an alteration of the contract, without the consent of the surety, will in general discharge him. Chit. Cont. 492 et seq.; 2 White & T. Lead. Cas. 892. 2. Discharge is a generic term; its principal species are rescission, release, accord and satisfaction, performance, judgment, composition, bankruptcy, merger (q. v.) Leake Cont. 413. 3. Discharge by operation of law is ing his agreement, the wife may disagree thereto, where the discharge takes place whether and so after her death may her heirs, if she does not herself agree thereto. Persons who purit was intended by the parties or not; thus, chase an estate under duress may disagree if a creditor appoints his debtor his execthereto when the duress ceases. (See Co. Litt. utor, the debt is discharged by operation 2b, 3a, 380b; 3 Prest. Abst. 104; 2 Bl. Com. of law, because the executor cannot have 292; Vin. Abr. Disagreement.) -Wharton
DISAGREEMENTmain
Black's Law Dictionary (2nd Ed.) • 1910
Difference of opinion or want of uniformity or concurrence of views; as, a disagreement among the members of a jury, among the judges of a court, or between arbitrators. Darnell y. Lyon, 85 Tex. 466, 22 S. W. 304; Insurance Co. v. Doying, 55 N. J. Law, 3569, 27 Atl. 927; Fowble v. Insurance Co., 106 Mo. App. 527, 81 S. W. 485. ‘ In real property law. The refusal by a grantee, lessee, etc., to accept an estate, lease, etc., made to him; the annulling of a thing that had essence before. No estate can be vested in a person against his will. Consequently no one can become a grantee, etc., without his agreement. The law implies such an agreement until the contrary is shown, but his disagreement renders the grant, etc., inoperative. Wharton. ' DISALT. To disable a person. - DISAPPROPRIATION. In ecclesiastical law. ‘his is where the appropriation of a benefice is severed, either by the patron presenting a clerk or by the corporation which has the appropriation being dissolved. 1 Bi. Comm. 385.
DISAGREEMENTn.
Websters Unabridged Dictionary (1913) • 1913
The state of disagreeing; a being at variance; dissimilitude; diversity. Unsuitableness; unadaptedness. [R.] Difference of opinion or sentiment. A falling out, or controversy; difference.
disagreementnoun
Wiktionary (English) • 2026
Wiktionary contributors • CC BY-SA 4.0 • via Kaikki
Extracted and formatted for display by Law Mind. Source link opens the current Wiktionary page and its contributor history; it is not a frozen copy of this extract.
An argument or debate. | A condition of not agreeing or concurring.

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