ENTRY AD COMMUNEM LEGEM

4 definitions found across Law Mind sources

ENTRY AD COMMUNEM LEGEMAuthored
The Law Mind • 892 words
Definition
Entry ad communem legem (Latin: "entry at common law") was a real action — a writ of entry — that lay in favor of a reversioner when a limited tenant had aliened the land during life and then died. The triggering condition was the combination of two events: (1) a tenant whose estate was less than fee simple — including a tenant for life, tenant pur autre vie (for the life of another), tenant by the curtesy, or tenant in dower — purported to convey the land to a third party, and (2) that tenant subsequently died. Upon the tenant's death, the particular estate expired and the reversion was supposed to vest in or return to the reversioner, but the alienee (or whoever was then in possession) wrongfully withheld possession. The writ of entry ad communem legem was the reversioner's mechanism to recover that possession. The action belonged to the broader family of writs of entry, which were real actions designed to recover seisin of land by alleging a specific defect or unlawfulness in the possessor's title. Unlike some writs of entry that were limited in the degrees of alienation they could reach, entry ad communem legem addressed the particular scenario of a deceased limited tenant's unauthorized conveyance.
Why It Matters in Research
This term is purely of historical and antiquarian relevance. The writ was already described as obsolete by leading 19th-century authorities before its formal abolition in England in 1883 under the Real Property Limitation Acts and the broader Victorian-era dismantling of the old real action system. Researchers will encounter it almost exclusively in pre-1883 English legal sources, in treatises on common law pleading and real property, and in historical surveys of the writ system. When tracing property disputes in older records — English Year Books, plea rolls, or early American colonial materials that transplanted English forms — the term may appear in its Latin form or in anglicized paraphrase ("writ of entry at common law"). Because the label "at common law" was used to distinguish this writ from statutory extensions of entry writs, researchers should be careful: in older sources, "common law" in this phrase signals procedural lineage, not a substantive legal standard. American reception of this writ was partial and uneven. Colonial and early-republic courts in some jurisdictions retained real actions including writs of entry longer than England did, but entry ad communem legem specifically appears rarely in American casebooks and digests. Where American sources do reference it, they typically do so to distinguish it from the broader writ of right or from possessory actions like ejectment, which eventually supplanted the entire class of real actions. Researchers using Bouvier's or Black's for historical research should note that both treat the writ as effectively dead even at the time of their publication. Bouvier explicitly dates formal abolition to 1883. Any appearance of this writ in post-1883 legal materials is either academic discussion or error.
Historical Dictionary Support
The three source dictionaries are tightly consistent on the writ's function and agree on the essential elements: the tenant must be of limited estate (life tenant, tenant pur autre vie, tenant by curtesy, or tenant in dower), must have aliened the land, and must have died before the action is brought. Black's, drawing on Brown's Legal Dictionary, and Rapalje & Lawrence, citing Termes de la Ley, both preserve the classical formulation closely. Bouvier provides the most contextual framing by situating the writ within the broader category of entry writs and supplying the abolition date of 1883. None of the three source dictionaries provides case authority or extended procedural guidance, which reflects the writ's obsolescence: by the time these dictionaries were compiled, entry ad communem legem had ceased to function as a live procedural tool and survived only as a term of historical art. Fitzherbert's Natura Brevium and older English form books would be the more appropriate sources for the full procedural mechanics of the writ. Researchers seeking depth should consult Blackstone's Commentaries (Book III) for the general treatment of real actions and writs of entry within the common law system.
Jurisdictional Note
The writ was an English common law form and was formally abolished in England in 1883. In the United States, real actions were abolished in federal courts and in most states well before 1883, with ejectment having displaced them in practice far earlier. This writ has no operative force in any current jurisdiction.
Related Terms
Writ of Entry — parent category; the broader class of real actions to which this writ belongs Reversioner — the party in whose favor the writ lay Particular Estate — the limited estate whose expiration triggered the writ Tenant for Life — one of the qualifying limited tenants Tenant Pur Autre Vie — tenant for the life of another; qualifying limited tenant Tenant by the Curtesy — qualifying limited tenant Tenant in Dower — qualifying limited tenant Alienation — the act by the limited tenant thatcombined with deathgave rise to the action Ejectment — the possessory action that displaced writs of entry in practice Real Actions — the historical category of actionsnow abolishedto which entry writs belonged Writ of Right — the highest of the real actions; related procedural context
ENTRY AD COMMUNEM LEGEMmain
Black's Law Dictionary • 1891
Entry at common law. The name of a writ of entry which lay for a reversioner after the alienation and death of the particular tenant for life, against him who was in possession of the land. Brown.
ENTRY AD COMMUNEM LEGEMmain
Bouvier's Law Dictionary • 1928
In English Law. A writ which lay in favor of the reversioner, when the tenant for term of life, tenant for term of anoth- er's life, tenant by the curtesy, or tenant in dower had aliened and died. Tomlin, Law Dict. Long obsolete, and abolished in 1883. ENTRY, WRIT OF. In Old Prac- tice. A real action brought to recover the possession of lands from one who wrong- fully withholds possession thereof. Such writs were said to be in the Quibus, where the suit was brought against the party who committed the wrong; in the Per, where the tenant against whom the action was brought was either heir or grantee of the original wrong-doer; in the Per and Cui, where there had been two descents, two alienations, or descent and an alienation; in the Post, where the wrong was removed beyond the degrees men- tioned. The above designations are derived from signif icant Latin words in the respective forms adapted to the cases given. A descent or alienation on the part of the disseisor constituted a degree (see Co. Litt. 299 a); and at common law the writ could be brought only within the degrees (two), the demand- ant after that being driven to his writ of right. By the statute of Maribridge (q. v.), 2 Hen. III. c. 30 (A. D. 1967), however, a writ of entry, after (post) those degrees had been passed in the alienation of the es- tate, was allowed. Where there had been no descent and the demandant himself had been dispossessed, the writ ran, Præcipe A quod reddat B sex acras terræ, etc. de quibus idem A, etc. (command A to restore to B six acres of land, etc., of which the said A, etc.); if there had been a descent after the de scription came, the clause, in quod idem A non ha bet ingressum nisi per C qui illud ei demisit (into which the said A. the tenant, has no entry but through C, who demised it to him); where there were two descents, nisi per Doui Cillud demisit (but by D, to whom C demised it); where it was be- yond the degrees, nisi post disseisinam quam C (but after the disseisin which C, the original disseisor, did, etc.). The writ was of many varieties, also, according to the character of the title of the claimant and the circumstances of the deprivation of possession. Booth enumerates and discusses twelve of these, of which some are sur disseisin, sur intrusion, ad com munem legem, ad terminum qui preterit, cui in vita, cui ante divortium, etc. Either of these might, of course, be brought in any of the four degrees, as the circumstances of the case required. The use of writs of entry has been long since abolished in Eng- land; but they are still in use in a modified form in some of the United States, as the common means of recovering possession of realty against a wrong- ful occupant; 2 Pick. 478; 10 id. 850; 5 N. H. 450; 88 Me. 21,71; 85 id. 90; 124 Masa. 807, 408; 189 id. 244; 157 id. See Stearn, Real Act.; Booth, R. A.; Co. Litt. 288 6. To maintain a writ of entry, the demand- ant who declares on his own seisin, and alleges a disseisin, is required to prove only that he has a right of entry and need not prove an actual wrongful dispossession or an adverse possession by the tenants; 161 Mass. 91.
ENTRY AD COMMUNEM LEGEMmain
Rapalje & Lawrence • 1888
-A writ of entry which lies where a tenant for life, for another's life, by the curtesy, or in dower, aliens and dies, against whomsoever is in after in the tenement.-Termes de la Ley.

Explore the full Law Mind legal research platform.

SubscribeEncyclopediaSign In