AGGREGATE. A collection of particular persons or items, formed into one body; as a corporation aggregate, which is one formed of a number of natural persons; the union of individual charges make an aggregate charge.
AGGRESSOR, crim. law. He who begins, a quarrel or dispute, either by threatening or striking another. No man may strike another because he has threatened, or in consequence of the use of any words.
AGIO, aggio. This term is used to denote the difference of price beteen the value of bank notes and nominal money, and the coin of the country. - Encyc.
AGIST, in contrads. The taking of other men's cattle on one's own ground at a certain rate. 2 Inst. 643; 4 Inst. 293.
AGISTER. One who takes horses or other animals to agist.
2. The agister is not, like an innkeeper, bound to take all horses offered to him, nor is he liable for any injury done to such animals in his care, unless he has been guilty of negligence, or from his ignorance, negligence may be inferred. Holt's R. 457.
AGISTMENT, contracts. The taking of another person's cattle into one's own ground to be fed, for a consideration to be paid by the owner. The person who receives the cattle is called an agister.
2. An agister is bound to ordinary diligence, and of course is responsible for loses by ordinary negligence; but he does not insure the safety of the cattle agisted. Jones, Bailm. 91; I Bell's Com. 458; Holt's N. P. Rep. 547; Story, Bail. 443; Bac. Ab. Tythes, C l.
AGNATES. In the sense of the Roman law were those whose propinquity was connected by males only; in the relation of cognates, one or more females were interposed.
2. By the Scotch lanv, agnates are all those who ar related by the father, even though females intervene; cognates are those who are related by the mother. Ersk. L. Scot. B. 1, t. 7, s. 4.
AGNATI, in descents. Relations on the father's side: they are different from the cognati, they being relations on the mother's side, affines, who are allied by marriage, and the propinqui, or relations in general. 2 Bl. Com. 235; Toull. Dr. Civ. Fr. tome 1, p. 139; Poth. Pand. Tom. 22, p. 27. Calvini Lex.
AGNATION, in descents. The relation by blood which exists between such males as are descended from the same father; in distinction from cognation or consanguinity, which includes the descendants from females. This term is principally used in the civil law.
AGRARIAN LAW. Among the Romans, this name was given to a law, which had for its object, the division among the people of all the lands which had been conquered, and which belonged to the domain of the state.
AGREEMENT, contract. The consent of two or more persons concurring, respecting the transmissiou of some property, right or benefit, with a view of contracting an obligation. Bac. Ab. h.t.; Com. Dig. h.t.; Vin. Ab. h.t.; Plowd. 17; 1 Com. Contr. 2; 5 East's R. 16. It will be proper to consider, 1, the requisites of an agreement; 2, the kinds of agreements; 3, how they are annulled.
2. - 1. To render an agreement complete six things must concur; there must be, 1, a person able to contract; 2, a person able to be contracted with; 3, a thing to be contracted for; 4, a lawful consideration, or quid pro quo; 5, words to express the agreement; 6, the assent of the contracting parties. Plowd. 161; Co. Litt. 35, b.
3. - 2. As to their form, agreements are of two kinds; 1, by parol, or, in writing, as contradistinguished from specialties; 2, by specialty, or under seal. In relation to their performance, agreements are executed or executory. An agreement is said to be executed when two or more persons make over their respective rights in a thing to one another, and thereby change the property therein, either presently and at once, or at a future time, upon some event that shall give it full effect, without either party trusting to the other; as where things are bought, paid for and delivered. Executory agreements, in the ordinary acceptation of the term, are such contracts as rest on articles, memorandums, parol promises, or undertakings, and the like, to be performed in future, or which are entered into preparatory to more solemn and formal alienations of prtperty. Powel on Cont. Agreements are also conditional and unconditional. They are conditional when some condition must be fulfilled before they can have full effect; they are unconditional when there is no condition attached;
4. - 3. Agreements are annulled or rendered of no effect, first, by the acts of the parties, as, by payment; release - accord and satisfction; rescission, which is express or implied; 1 Watts & Serg. 442; defeasance; by novation: secondly, by the acts of the law, as, confusion; merger; lapse of time; death, as when a man who has bound himself to teach an apprentice, dies; extinction of the thing which is the subject of the contract, as, when the agreement is to deliver a certain horse and before the time of delivery he dies. See Discharge of a Contract.
5. The writing or instrument containing an agreement is also called an agreement, and sometimes articles of agreement.(q. V.)
6. It is proper, to remark that there is much dfference between an agreement and articles of agreement which are only evidence of it. From the moment that the parties have given their consent, the agreement or contraet is formed, and, whether it can be proved or not, it has not less the quality to bind both contracting parties. A want of proof does not make it null, because that proof may be supplied aliunde, and the moment it is obtained, the contract may be-enforced.
7. Again, the agreement may be mull, as when it was obtained by fraud, duress, and the like; and the articles of agreement may be good, as far as the form is concerned. Vide Contract. Deed; Guaranty; Parties to Contracts.
AGRI. Arable land in the common fields. Cunn. Dict. h. t.
AGRICULTURE. The art of cultivating the earth in order to obtain from it the divers things it can produce; and particularly what is useful to man, as grain, fruit's, cotton, flax, and other things. Domat, Dr. Pub. liv. tit. 14, s. 1, n. 1.
AID AND COMFORT. The constitution of the United States, art. 8, s. 3, declares, that adhering to the enemies of the United States, giving them aid and comfort, shall be treason. These words, as they are to be understood in the constitution, have not received a full judicial construction. They import, however, help, support, assistance, countenance, encouragement. The word aid, which oocurs in the Stat. West. 1, c. 14, is explained by Lord Coke (2 just. 182) as comprehending all persons counselling, abetting, plotting, assenting, consenting, and encouraging to do the act, (and he adds, what is not applicable to the Crime to treason,) who are not present when the act is done, See, also, 1 Burn's Justice, 5, 6; 4 Bl. Com. 37, 38.
AID PRAYER, English law. A petition to the court calling in help from another person who has an interest in the matter in dispute. For example, a tenant for life, by the courtesy or for years, being impleaded, may pray aid of him in reversion; that is, desire the court that he may be called by writ, to allege what he thinks proper for the maintenance of the right of the person calling him, and of his own. F. N. B. 60; Cowel.
AIDERS, crim. law. Those who assist, aid, or abet the principal, and who are principals in the second degree. 1. Russell, 21.
AIDS, Engl. law. Formerly they were certain sums of money granted by the tenant to his lord in times of difficulty and distress, but, as usual in such cases, what was received as a gratuity by the rich and powerful from the weak and poor, was soon claimed as a matter of right; and aids became a species of tax to be paid by the tenant to his lord, in these cases: 1. To ransom the lord's person, when taken priisoner; 2. To make the lord's eldest son a knight; - 3. To marry the lord's eldest daughter, by giving her a suitable portion. The first of these remained uncertain; the other two were fixed by act of parliament at twenty shillings each being the supposed twentieth part of a knight's fee, 2 Bl. Com. 64.
AILE or AYLE, domestic relations. This is a corruption of the French word aieul, grandfather, avus. 3.Bl. Com. 186.
AIR. That fluid transparent substance which surrounds our globe.
2. No property can be had in the air it belongs equally to all men, being indispensable to their existence. To poison or materially to change the air, to the annoyance of the public, is a nuisance. Cro. Cr. 610; 2 Ld. Raym 1163; I Burr. 333; 1 Str. 686 Hawk. B. 1, c. 75, s. 10; Dane's Ab. Index h. t. But this must be understood with this qualification, that no one has a right to use the air over another man's land, in such a manner as to be injurious to him. See 4 Campb. 219; Bowy. Mod. Civ. Law, 62; 4 Bouv. Inst. n. 36 1; Grot. Droit de la Guerre et de la Paix, liv. 2, c. 2, 3, note, 3 et 4.
3. It is the right of the proprietor of an estate to enjoy the light and air that will come to him, and, in general, no one has a right to deprive him of them; but sometimes in building, a man opens windows over his neighbor's ground, and the latter, desirous of building on his own ground, necessarily stops the windows already built, and deprives the first builder of light and air; this he has the right to do, unless the windows are ancient lights, (q. v.) or the proprietor has acquired a right by grant or prescription to have such windows open. See Crabb on R. P. 444 to 479 and Plan. Vide Nuisance.
AJUTAGE. A conical tube, used in drawing water through an aperture, by the use of which the quantity of water drawn is much increased. When a privilege to draw water from a canal through the forebay or tunnel by means of in aperture has been granted, it is not lawful to add an adjutage, unless such was the intention of the parties. 2 Whart. R. 477.
ALABAMA. The name of one of the new states of the United States of America. This state was admitted into the Union by the resolution of congress, approved December 14th, 1819, 3 Sto. L. U. S. 1804, by which it is resolved that the state of Alabama shall be one, and is hereby declared to be one of the United States of America, and admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original states, in all respects whatever. The convention which framed the constitution in this state, assembled at the town of Huntsville on Monday the fifth day of July, 1819, and continued in session by adjournment, until the second day of August, 1819, when the constitution was adopted.
2. The powers of the government are divided by the constitution into three distinct, departments; and each of them confided to a separate body of magistracy, to wit: those which are legislative, to one; those which are executive, to another; and those which are judicial, to a third. Art. 2,
3. - 1. The legislative power of the state is vested in two distinct branches; the one styled the senate, the other the house of representatives, and both together, the general assembly of the state of Alabama. 1. The senate is never to be less than one-fourth nor more than one-third of the whole number of representatives. Senators are chosen by the qualified electors for the term of three years, at the same time, in the same manner, and at the same place, where they vote for members of the house of representatives; one-third of the whole number of senators are elected every year. Art. 3, s. 12. 2. The house of representatives is to consist of not less than forty-four, nor more than sixty members, until the number of white inhabitant's shall be one hundred thousand; and after that event, the whole number of representatives shall never be less than sixty, nor more than one hundred. Art. 3, B. 9. The members of the house of representatives are chosen by the qualified electors for the term of one year, from the commencement of the general election, and no longer.
4. - 2. The supreme executive power is vested in a chief magistrate, styled the governor of the state of Alabama. He is elected by the qualified electors, at the time and places when they respectively vote for representatives; he holds his office for the term of two years from the time of his installation, and until a successor is duly qualified; and is not eligible more than four years in any term of six years. t. 4. He is invested, among other things, with the veto power. Ib. s. 16. In cases of vacancies, the president of the senate acts as governor. Art. 4, s. 18.
5. - 3. The judicial power is vested in one supreme court, circuit courts to be held in each county in the state, and such inferior courts of law and, equity, to consist of not more than five members, as the general assembly may, from time to time direct, ordain, and establish. Art. 6, S. 1.
ALBA FIRMA. Eng. law. When quit rents were reserved payable in silver or white money, they wero called white rents, or blanch farms reditus albi. When they were reserved payable in work, grain, or the like, they were called reditus nigri or black mail. 2 Inst. 19.
ALCADE, Span. law. The name of a judicial officer in Spain, and in those countries which have received the body of their laws from those of Spain.
ALDERMAN. An officer, generally appointed or elected in towns corporate, or cities, possessing various powers in different places.
2. The aldermen of the cities of Pennsylvania, possess all the powers and jurisdictions civil and criminal of justices of the peace. They are besides, in conjunction with the respective mayors or recorders, judges of ibe mayor's courts.
3. Among the Saxons there was an officer called the ealderman. ealdorman, or aldernwn, which appellation signified literally elderman. Like the Roman senator, he was so called, not on account of his age, but because of his wisdom and dignity, non propter oetatem sed propter sapientism et dignitatem. He presided with the bisbop at the scyregemote, and was, ex officio, a member of the witenagemote. At one time he was a military officer, but afterwards his office was purely judical.
4. There were several kinds of aldermen, as king's aldermen, aldermen of all England, aldermen of the county, aldermen of the hundred, &c., to denote difference of rank and jurisdiction.
ALEA; civil law. The chance of gain or loss in a contract. This chance results either from the uncertainty of the thing sold, as the effects of a succession; or from the uncertainty of the price, as when a thing is sold for an annuity, which is to be greater or less on the happening of a future event; or it sometimes arises in consequence of the uncertainty of both. 2 Duv. Dr. Civ. Fr. n. 74.
ALEATORY CONTRACTS, civil law. A mutual agreement, of which the effects, with respect both to the advantages and losses, whether to all the parties, or to some of them, depend on an uncertain event. Civ. Code of Louis. art. 2951.
2. - These contracts are of two kinds; namely, 1. When one of the parties exposes himself to lose something which will be a profit to the other, in consideration of a sum of money which the latter pays for the risk. Such is the contract of insurance; the insurer takes all the risk of the sea, and the assured pays a premium to the former for the risk which he runs.
3. - 2. In the second kind, each runs a risk which is the consideration of the engagement of the other; for example, when a person buys an annuity, he runs the risk of losing the consideration, in case of his death soon after, but he may live so as to receive three times the amount of the price he paid for it. Merlin, Rep. mot Aleatoire.
ALER SANS JOUR, or aller sans jour, in practice. A French phrase which means go without day; and is used to signify that the case has been finally dismissed the court, because there is no further day assigned for appearance. Kitch. 146.
ALFET, obsolete. A vessel in which hot water was put, for the purpose of dipping a criminal's arm in it up to the elbow.