CHAPTER II.

OF PERSONS OR THE SUBJECTS OF RIGHTS AND DUTIES.

I.-LEGAL CAPACITY.

§ 101.

We have next (§ 57) to consider the subjects of rights and duties, that is to say the persons to whom something is possible or necessary. In the first place we must examine who or what, either from its very nature or by the precepts of positive law, can be considered as capable of rights and duties.

By Person is meant whatever in any respect is regarded as the subject of a right: by Thing on the other hand is denoted whatever is opposed to person.f

The legal capacity of a person as fixed by positive law is called by the Romans caput or status. Modern writers, however, make use of the expression status civilis to denote such capacity, together with all the peculiarities annexed to it by law and on which single rights depend; and by way of distinction they use the phrase status naturalis to denote natural legal capacity together with those physical properties which give rise to special legal consequences.

1.-Natural Status.

A. HUMAN FORM.
§ 102.

In order that natural legal capacity h may be attributed to any

f pr. I. de iure person. (1. 3.) § 4. I. de cap. minut. (1. 16.) L. 20. § 7. qui test. fac. poss. (28. 1.).

• Taken in a general sense this includes status libertatis, civitatis and familiæ; pr. I. de cap. dem. (1. 16.) in a narrower sense only the 1st and 2nd. L. 3. § 1. L. 4. de cap. min. (4. 5.) L. 1. § 8. ad SCt. Tertyll. (38. 17.). Feuerbach civil. Vers. 1. B. Nr. 6. Compare Savigny System B. 2. Beil. 6. Savigny ubi supra § 61. 62.

one human form is essentially requisite: but it is not indispensible that the form if human be that ordinarily observed; it may be very unusual (portentum, ostentum). That which being born of a woman is wholly devoid of those physical features which are characteristic of the human race is called monstrum, and is not considered capable of having any right; but its existence is not allowed to depend on the mere will of its parents, and such a monstrosity may for their advantage be deemed a child, m

B. BIRTH.
$103.

A human being cannot be considered as the subject of rights unless actually born, i.e. in some way or other separated from its mother. That which is in the womb (embryo also sometimes called venter), is in strictness deemed part of the mother;" but all those acts are forbidden which prevent the development or future birth of the fœtus.o

It is also laid down as a principle, that in those cases in which the child can be thereby benefited, its legal capacity is to be considered as dating from the time of conception, but in all other cases from the time of birth. P

C. LIFE.
§ 104.

The human being must be born alive. Of this fact not only

1 L. 38. de V. S. (50. 16.).

L. 14. de stat. hom. (1. 5.). Haller gerichtl. Arzneiw. 1. Thl. p. 184. 185. C. L. Schweickhardt Beschreibung einer Missgeburt nebst einigen medic. Bemerk. über diesen Gegenstand. Tübing. 1801. 3. Abschn.

1 Huber L. 1. T. 5. § 7. Somewhat different opinions are entertained, (partly from what is said by Haller ubi supra 190) by Leyser Sp. 15. cor. 2. Vol. IX. Sp. 47. M. 7. Müller ad Leyser Obs. 83.

m

L. 135. de V. S. (50. 16.). Walch ad Eckhard herm. iur. § 199.

n

L. 1. § 1. de ventr. inspic. (25. 4.) L. 9. § 1. ad L. Falcid. (35. 2.). Eckhard hermen. iur. § 137. See upon this subject C. H. Mauchart über die Rechte des Menschen vor s. Geburt. Frkf. & Leipz. 1782.

• L. 18. de stat. hom. (1. 5.) L. 2. de mort. inf. (11. 8.) L. 3. de poen.

(48. 19.).

P pr. I. de ingenuis (1. 4.) L. 18. 26. de stat. hom. (1. 5.) L. 7. § 1. de senator. (1. 9.).

a vocal sound, but any other well ascertained sign of life is legal evidence. It is also commonly supposed that it is as necessary as birth itself that the child shall be born 182 days after conception, but this is only requisite in reference to the rights of status.r

§ 105.

Proof of life and death.-Birth and death must be proved by him who alleges them to have taken place. Proof of death has by modern usage been rendered comparatively easy, partly by the admission of evidence of a somewhat loose nature, and partly by presuming the death of a person who has disappeared and cannot be found, and who can be shown to be 70 years old.

If several persons die " and it cannot by any satisfactory evidence be discovered which died before the other, then if they died a natural death the eldest is usually presumed to have died first; "

r

L. 3. C. de post. hered. inst. (6. 29.).

L. 12. de stat. hom. (1. 5.) L. 3. § 12. de suis et legitim. (38. 16.) L. 2. 3. C. de post. her. (6. 29.). Seuffert Erört. einzeln. Lehren. 1. Abthl. Nr. 9. Savigny System B. 2. Beilage III. Contra Warnkönig in Rosshirt Zeitsch. B. 2. 442. For the different opinions and medical doubts upon this subject see W. G. Ploucquet über die phys. Erfordernisse der Erbfähigkeit. Tub. 1779. § 71. 72. Cocceii I. C. L. 1. T. 6. qu. 3. Glück Pand. 28. B. 108–138. Elwers Themis B. 2. N. 14. Stryk U. M. P. L. 1. T. 5. § 14. C. A. Fabrot Ex. 1. de tempore partus humani (in Otto Th. T. 3.).

• I. C. Finke de unius testis confessione. Goett. 1798. § 9. But see contra I. N. Hert de apertura testam. (op. V. 2. T. 3.) Sect. 1. § 14.

Koch succ. ab intest. Auct. 1. Müller ad Leyser Obs. 240. Köchy Medit. 1. B. Nr. 23. Before this, life is to be presumed; see other opinions expressed by Heise and Cropp jurist. Abh. 2. B. Nr. 5. Bolley jurist. Aufs. 1. B. Stuttg. 1831. Nr. 3.

See generally I. F. de Retes de commorient. iure; in opusc. L. 7. c. 5. (Meerman Th. T. 6.). E. A. van Voorst de iure quod oritur ex commorientibus ad varia iur. Rom. loca. Ultrai. 1757. (Oelrichs Thes. nov. T. 2. V. 2. Nr. 9.). Glück v. der Intestat-Erbfolge § 4. Archiv für civilist. Praxis. B. 4. Nr. 27. T. H. F. Gaedcke de iure commorientium. Rostoch. 1830. Vangerow Leitfaden § 33. Anm. 2.

* The opinions of medical men are unreasonably excluded by Gaedcke 1. c. p. 20-26. 142–146.

On account of L. 15. pr. de inoff. test. (5. 2.). But to take the strongest view this law only applies to the case of parents and their children. In other cases the customary rule is to be followed. Savigny System B. 2. § 63.

but if their death was violent, the presumption is that neither died before or after the other; and this is so even in cases of married people. With respect, however, to parents and children there is, in the absence of all special reasons to the contrary, a presumption that the children died first if they were under age, and last if not. If some of the persons died a natural and the others a violent death, no legal presumption is directed to be raised, and consequently the general principle that neither can be presumed to have died before or after the other must be followed. It may of course happen that owing to the terms of a particular instrument these presumptions are not required to be acted upon.d

2. Civil Status.
$106.

Status civilis (§ 101) is of three sorts, status libertatis, civitatis, and familiæ, according as a person is or not free, a civis, and a member of a familia. The loss of status is termed status mutatio, or capitis diminutio, and may be maxima, media or minima, according as the loss is of the status libertatis, civitatis or familiæ. The two first are also called magna, and the last, sometimes, minor.g

L. 9. pr. L. 16. pr. § 1. L. 18. de reb. dub. (34. 5.) L. 34. ad SCt. Treb. (36. 1.). A. Faber coni. L. 13. c. 14. 16. compared with Averan. int. L. 5. c. 31. n. 8.

a

L. 32. § 14. de don. int. V. et U. (24. 1.) L. 26. de mort. c. don. (39. 6.). Glück loc. cit. 14. 15.

b L. 17. § 7. ad SCt. Treb. (36. 1.). Voet comm. L. 24. T. 1. § 3. L. 36. T. 1. § 16. Voorda elect. c. 20.

L. 9. § 1. § ult. L. 22. L. 23. de reb. dub. (34. 5.) L. 29. de vulg. subst. (28. 6.) L. 11. § 1. de captiv. (49. 15.). See more fully as to this, Gaedcke 1. c. p. 61-85. 104-112. 116-122.

d This is the sense of L. 9. pr. de reb. dub. (34. 5.) and probably also of L. 17. § 7. ad SCt. Treb. (36. 1.).

e Inst. L. 1. T. 3-8. Savigny System 2. B. § 65–67. Puchta Cursus der Inst. 2. Bd. § 220.

Gaius I. 158-163. Tit. Inst. de cap. min. (1. 16.) Tit. Dig. de cap. min. (4.5.) Löhr Mag. 4. B. Nr. 1. A. H. E. F. a Seckendorff de cap. dem. Savigny System 2. B. § 68–75. and Beilage VI.

minima. Colon. 1828.

L. 1. § 4. de suis (38. 16.) L. 5. § 3. de extr. cogn. (50. 13.) Noodt obs.

L. 2. c. 21.

§ 107.

Actiones præjudiciales.-Actions relating to status are called actiones præjudiciales, and are divided into affirmative, if their object is to have a status recognised, and negative if their object is the contrary. For the purpose of preventing cases of unlawful and oppressive detention, every free man is entitled to the interdictum de libero homine exhibendo. The right to enquire into the status of a person deceased, lasts only five years. It is not necessary to examine further into the law relating to status, for what is obsolete with respect to the status libertatis and civitatis is matter for legal history, and what is of present importance is within the province of writers on modern and not Roman law. The law concerning the status familiæ moreover can only be explained when the doctrines relating to patria potestas are examined.

II.-OF ONE PERSON WITH SEVERAL RIGHTS.

§ 108.

Several persons may be the subjects of one right or of one duty, and one person may be the subject of several rights or several duties. With respect to the latter it is only necessary here to observe that:

k

1. If several rights and duties meet in the same person and are not extinguished by the principles before (§ 83) laid down each right may be exercised by, and each duty enforced against that person to its full extent.!

2. If one only of such rights can be exercised, the choice lies, as a general rule, with the person in whom they reside; m and

Tit. D. de hom. lib. exhib. (43. 29.). Schilter ex. 23. § 25.

Tit. D. ne de statu defunct. (40. 15.) tit. C. cod. (7. 21.) Puchta ubi supra. § 221.

× L. 3. de adopt. (1. 7.) I. N. Hert de uno homine plures sustinente personas. Giess. 1699. (in op. Vol. 1. T. 3. p. 27.)

1 Koch success. ab intest. Auct. III. § 1.

L. 12. pr. de legat. I. (30.). Hert 1. c. Sect. 1. § 3. 5. Mevius P. 1.

Dec. 291.