Definition
A Latin phrase meaning "to the person first applying." Used in probate practice to describe the rule governing administration grants when two or more persons stand in equal entitlement — as when multiple next of kin share the same degree of relation to the decedent. In such cases, the court resolves the tie by priority of application: the grant of administration goes to whichever eligible person applies first. The rule does not confer any substantive advantage on the first applicant beyond breaking the tie; it presupposes that all competing applicants are otherwise equally qualified and equally entitled under the applicable rules of intestate succession or statutory priority.
Why It Matters in Research
This term appears almost exclusively in probate and administration practice, and researchers are unlikely to encounter it outside that context. Its significance is procedural rather than substantive: it answers the question of who among equally ranked claimants receives letters of administration, not who is eligible in the first place.
Researchers consulting older probate practice materials — particularly English treatises on ecclesiastical and prerogative court procedure — will encounter the phrase frequently, since the rule has deep roots in English ecclesiastical jurisdiction over testamentary matters. The second edition of Black's cites Browne's and Coote's probate practice treatises, both of which are English authorities. American adoption of the rule was widespread but varied in expression: some states codified priority of administration in their probate statutes, which may render the common-law priori petenti rule secondary or displaced.
A key research trap is confusing this procedural tiebreaker with the broader subject of priority among creditors, legatees, and other estate claimants. The Rapalje & Lawrence entry conflates the phrase with a general discussion of priority doctrines — including registration acts and the order of creditor claims in estate administration — which suggests that researchers using that source may be pulled away from the specific procedural meaning of the phrase toward the larger topic of priority law. Keep the distinction in view: priori petenti addresses who gets appointed administrator when eligible persons are tied; creditor and legatee priority addresses the order in which claims are satisfied from estate assets. These are related but separate questions.
Because this phrase appears in Latin and in older English-derived practice materials, it may be indexed inconsistently in historical databases. Search variant spellings (the second edition of Black's records the phrase as "priori pctenti," an evident typographic error) and consider searching the underlying concept — "first applicant," "grant of administration," "equally entitled" — when full-text searching historical probate records or treatises.
Historical Dictionary Support
All three source dictionaries agree on the core meaning: the grant goes to the first applicant when candidates are equally entitled. Black's first and second editions are consistent; the second edition provides the fuller treatment, citing English probate practice authorities and specifying the example of next of kin of the same degree as the paradigm case.
Rapalje & Lawrence's treatment is less clean. The entry begins with the correct gloss — "to the person first applying" — but then pivots into a general discussion of priority doctrine covering registration acts, creditor claims, and estate administration more broadly. This suggests either that the editors used the phrase as a hook for a wider discussion of priority, or that the entry is composite. Researchers should not rely on Rapalje & Lawrence for the specific procedural content of priori petenti; the Black's second edition entry is more reliable for that purpose.
None of the historical sources address how American statutory probate codes interacted with or displaced the common-law rule, which is a significant gap for researchers working in American jurisdictions after the mid-nineteenth century.
Jurisdictional Note
In American jurisdictions, statutory probate codes largely govern the order of priority for letters of administration, and the common-law priori petenti rule operates only in the residual space where the statute does not resolve a tie among equally ranked applicants. Researchers should check the applicable state's probate statute before assuming the common-law rule controls.