Thellusson Act
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence · Benjamin Vaughan Abbott · 1879
Dictionary of Terms and Phrases Used in American or English Jurisprudence
The Stat. 39 the will made by a Mr. Thellusson. He was a person of great wealth; and by his will, after providing for his immediate descendants, he left the bulk of his property to be accumulated until his descendants living or in ventre sa mere at the time of his death should be dead. The act called the Thellusson act was passed to prevent a repetition of a bequest of this kind. By its provisions, a grantor or testator is forbidden to direct the accumulation of his property for a period exceeding twenty-one years from his death, subject to certain exceptions mentioned in the act. The principle of thus restricting the power to create a perpetuity, or to suspend the power of alienation of property given by will, has been widely adopted, by legislation, throughout the United States.