LEGITIME

1 definition found

From Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856) [bouvier]:

  LEGITIME, civil law. That portion of a parent's estate of which he cannot 
  disinherit his children, without a legal cause. The civil code of Louisiana 
  declares that donations inter vivos or mortis causa cannot exceed two-thirds 
  of the property of the disposer if he leaves at his decease a legitimate 
  child; one half if he leaves two children; and one-third if he leaves three 
  or a greater number. Under the name of children are included descendants of 


  whatever degree they may be; it must be understood that they are only 
  counted for the child they represent. Civil. Code of Lo. art. 1480. 
       3. Donation inter vivos or mortis causa, cannot exceed two-thirds of 
  the property if the disposer having no children have a father, mother, or 
  both. Id. art. 1481. Where there are no descendants, and in case of the 
  previous decease of the father and mother, donations inter vivos and mortis 
  causa, may, in general, be made of the whole amount of the property of the 
  disposer. Id. art. 1483. The Code Civil makes nearly similar provisions. 
  Code Civ. L. 3, t. 2, c. 3, s. 1, art. 913 to 919. 
       4. In Holland, Germany, and Spain, the principles of the Falcidian law, 
  more or less limited, have been generally adopted. Coop. Just. 616. 
       5. In the United States, other than Louisiana and in England, there is 
  no restriction on the right of bequeathing. But this power of bequeathing 
  did not originally extend to all a man's personal estate; on the contrary, 
  by the common law, as it stood in the reign of Henry II, a man's goods were 
  to be divided into three equal parts, one of which went to his heirs or 
  lineal descendants, another to his wife, and the third was at his own 
  disposal; or if he died without a wife, he might then dispose of one moiety, 
  and the other went to his children; and so e converso if he had no children, 
  the wife was entitled to one moiety, and he might bequeath the other; but if 
  he died without either wife or issue, the whole was at his own disposal. 
  Glanv. 1. 2, c. 6;, Bract. 1. 2, c. 26. The shares of the wife and children 
  were called their reasonable part. 2 Bl. Comm. 491-2. See Death's part; 
  Falcidian law.