EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT actual conversion covenanted or directed to be made has not been made, and though there has been no election not to have it made, namely, where the absolute owner of money which has been converted in equity into land has the money in his own hands, — in which case the money is said to be at home; and it seems not to be material whether he has possession of the money in his own right or as executor only." PROPERTY (See Mortgages, Mining).
PUBLIC POLICY. " Blackmail and Ex tortion," by James W. Osborne, Bench and Bar (V. iv, p. 50). . RAILROADS (See Constitutional Law). SALES (See Contracts). TORTS (Injunction). An interesting com mentary on the recent report of the English commission appointed in 1903, after the famous Taff Vale case, to inquire into trade disputes is published serially in the Law Times beginning March 3, 1906 (V. cxx, p. 390) under the title of " Trade Disputes and Combinations. ' ' TORTS (See Negligence). TRUSTS (Free Church Case). In the March Columbia Law Review (V. vi, p. 137) Judge Francis C. Lowell discusses " The Free Church of Scotland Case " from an American point of view. The decision he states was rested upon two grounds. "First, that the United Free Church had departed from the doctrine of the Free Kirk, in that it no longer adhered to the dogma of establishment, the dogma that a state ought to maintain a particular form of religion. Second, that the United Free Church had abandoned the dogma of predestination, which was an essential part of the doctrine of the Free Kirk." To an American lawyer the question con cerns the construction of a charitable trust. Hecontends that the disposition of gifts by will must depend upon the language of the sev eral wills. Yet the House of Lords construed wills by the hundred without reference to any of them. The reports of the decision omit "First, to state the precise question involved in the two cases; Second, to recognize that the donors were many, and that the inten tion of one might be quite different from that of another; Third, to set out the language used in the several gifts; and Fourth, the
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failure in the first case to state if there was a general deed or declaration of trust. These omissions are hard to understand. Some of them, but not all, may be set down to differ ences between Scotch and American law." . In America he says the court would con strue the terms of a charitable gift in the light of surrounding circumstances and Scotch ecclesiastical history would be deemed such a circumstance and no more. The Lords, how ever, quoted from the writings of certain preachers of the faith to ascertain its dogmas although these opinions have never been for mally adopted as symbols of the faith. The American court would have attached more importance to the form of organization of the members of a church and would have regarded a gift to the church as a gift to the body whose views were to be determined by a majority. He believes that the difference in point of view may depend in part upon the different ecclesiastical history of the two countries. But upon the evidence even if the House of Lords were required unaided by a denomina tional tribunal or ecclesiastical decisions, to determine if there had been an abandonment of essential dogmas of the faith, the question, it seems, should have been answered in the negative. "We find, then, that the Free Church case is hard to understand. First, from the omis sion in the report of a statement of the precise controversy. Second, from the failure of the Lords to seek the intentions of the individual donors of the fund in question. Third, from the assumption that continued identity of doctrine, apart from express requirement, is essential to a Christian church. Fourth, from the disregard of the ecclesiastical judg ment of the Free Church upon the dogmatic questions involved. Fitjh, from the failure to recognize that modification of doctrine was expressly permitted by the Barrier Act, and union with another religious body by the Model Trust Deed. Sixth, from an exaggera tion of the importance of the principle of es tablishment, and from an erroneous concep tion of Calvinism not entertained by American Calvinists." WILLS. In the March Columbia Law Review (V. vi, p: 175) George H. Yeamans discusses the curious antiquated rules regard ing " Definite and Indefinite Failure of Issue."
