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1 Cow. 568

Ex parte Coburn

New York Supreme Court

Decided October 15, 1823

New York Supreme Court · decided 1823-10-15

Starkweather, at the last term, moved for a mandamus, commanding the Judges of the Otsego Common Pleas to give judgment in favour bf the plaintiff, for his costs in an action of trespass, quare clausum fregit, tried there between Coburn, plaintiff, and Thurston, defendant. One of the pleas was leave and license; to which the plaintiff replied, taking issue.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1823-10-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently July 1968

7 state decisions

20182318301840185018601870188018901900191019201930194019501960decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Curia.

¶1This is not like a right of way to which it has been likened in the argument. A right of way is an assignable property: it is a real or chattel interest, according to the' term of its duration, and the former is well known in the law as that sort of real property belonging to the class of incorporeal hereditaments. Not so of a licence to enter upon another’s land, without consideration. This is not an interest. It is a mere authority, revocable at any moment, not in its nature assignable, but limited to the person of the grantee.Giving permission to walk across one’s land is but an excuse for a trespass. The case of Heaton v. Ferris, referred to on the argument, views the subject in this light, and we think,disposes of the'question. That was an action on the case for consequential damages, occasioned by the defendant’s mill dam, erected on his own land, overflowing the' plaintiff’s land. The defendant set up'á licence, which appeared to have been revoked. The plaintiff’s verdict being but nine dollars, he applied for costs, on the ground that the freehold or title came in question, which the Court denied. There' Is no difference in principle, whether the action be case for a consequential injury, or, as here, trespass for a direct one.

¶2Rule discharged.

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