Definition
A single demise is a declaration in ejectment that contains only one demise — that is, a single fictitious grant or lease alleged to support the plaintiff's possessory claim to land. In the common law action of ejectment, the plaintiff could plead one or more such demises; when only one was pleaded, the declaration was described as being "with a single demise," as opposed to a declaration with multiple demises.
To understand what this means, some context is necessary. The common law action of ejectment was a highly technical proceeding in which the plaintiff, to establish a right to possession of land, would fictitiously allege that a named lessor had leased the disputed property to a fictitious lessee (the nominal plaintiff), and that the lessee had been ejected by the defendant. Each such fictitious lease constituted a "demise." A declaration with a single demise named only one lessor and one such fictitious lease. A declaration with multiple demises named several, each resting on a different theory of title, to hedge against the possibility that one theory might fail at trial.
---
Common Confusion
Single demise should not be confused with the term "demise" as used in admiralty and property law more broadly. In admiralty, a "demise charter" (or bareboat charter) transfers full possession and control of a vessel to the charterer — a substantively different concept with no connection to ejectment procedure. In property law generally, "demise" can mean simply a lease or conveyance of real property. The phrase "single demise" is specific to the procedural context of the historical common law ejectment action and has no application outside that context.
---
Why It Matters in Research
This term belongs almost entirely to the pre-reform era of common law pleading. The action of ejectment in its classic fictitious form was abolished in England by the Common Law Procedure Act 1852 and was gradually displaced in American jurisdictions through the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as states adopted reformed pleading codes and, eventually, rules modeled on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Researchers will encounter "single demise" almost exclusively in older English and American cases and treatises — roughly pre-1850 in English sources and varying by state in American sources.
When reading historical ejectment decisions, the distinction between a single demise and multiple demises matters because it affected both strategy and risk. A plaintiff who pleaded only a single demise was locked into one theory of title; if that theory failed, so did the action. A plaintiff who pleaded multiple demises had more flexibility but faced different procedural constraints. Courts sometimes commented on whether a verdict or judgment was sustainable on the particular demise that had been pleaded, making the single-versus-multiple-demise question relevant to understanding why certain cases came out as they did.
Researchers working in the Law Mind corpus should note that "demise" appears in several distinct legal contexts — property conveyancing, ejectment procedure, and admiralty chartering — and that sources indexed under "demise" may not be relevant to ejectment procedure specifically. The admiralty encyclopedia entry on demise charters, cross-referenced above, addresses a wholly separate body of law.
---
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary captures the essential procedural point concisely: a declaration in ejectment could contain either one demise or several, and when it contained only one, it was called a declaration with a single demise. This is accurate as far as it goes, but the entry offers no guidance on why the choice mattered or how courts treated it. Classical treatises on pleading — including those of Chitty and Stephen — provide considerably more context on the strategic implications of the single demise and the rules governing variance between the demise alleged and the proof offered at trial. Researchers relying solely on the Black's entry will have the vocabulary but not the functional understanding needed to work with historical ejectment materials.
---
Jurisdictional Note
The procedural context giving rise to this term — the fictitious action of ejectment — varied in its details and in the timing of its abolition across American jurisdictions. Some states retained modified forms of the action longer than others. The term is most likely to appear in English common law sources and in American case law and treatises from before the mid-to-late nineteenth century.
---
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Charter Parties — Voyage, Time, Bareboat/Demise, and Hybrid Charters (The Law Mind Military, Veterans & Admiralty Law Encyclopedia) — for the distinct admiralty meaning of "demise" as used in chartering law.
---