Escheat

Escheat, from the Norman-French eschet, which is from the word eschier or eschoir, to fall; for an escheat is a casual profit, which falls to the lord of the fee, from whom, or from whose ancestor, the estate, was originally derived, taking it as ultimus haeres upon the failure, natural or legal, of the intestate tenant's family. It differs from Forfeiture (now abolished for treason or felony) in that the latter is a penalty for a crime personal to the offender, of which the Crown is entitled to take advantage by virtue of its prerogative; while an escheat results from tenure only, and arises from an obstruction in the course of descent. It had its origin in feudal times; while forfeiture affects the rents and profits only, escheat operates on the inheritance. Escheat follows, then, on default of heirs, when the tenant dies without any lawful and natural-born relations on the part of any of his ancestors, or when he dies without any lawful and natural-born relations on the part of those ancestors from whom the estate descended, or where the intestate tenant, having been a bastard, does not leave lineal descendants, since he cannot have any collateral descendants. It also arose from corruption of blood (now abolished by 33 and 34 Victoria, c. 23), when the tenant had been convicted of treason or felony. For the protection of beneficiaries of estates the statute law has made an exception to the general law of Escheat in the case of a trustee or mortgagee dying intestate and heirless (13 and 14 Victoria, c.60), and by the Intestates' Estates Act, 1884, equitable estates and interests in incorporeal hereditaments (which prior to that Act did not escheat) are subject to the same law of Escheat as legal estates in corporeal hereditaments. The Intestates' Estates Act, 1884, also provides for the waiver by the Crown of its right by escheat in favour of the intestate's family, or of any person considered or adopted as part of his family as pointed out by the Statute 59 George IV., c. 94.