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Tibballs v. Iffland, 10 W. 451, decides:

(1) Practice question.

(2) Question as to admissibility of evidence.

(3) When secondary evidence may be introduced as to the contents of a writing and evidence of diligence to get the writing is addressed to the court and not to the jury.

(4) Our statute does not require a lease to be recorded.

(5) Assignee of lease may re-assign to be rid of liability, and this without notice to the lessor.

There is nothing there illustrating the relation between landlord and tenant. January, 1895. Jefferson county. Anders, J.

Byers v. Rothchild, 11 Wash. 296, decided (1) That where the rent became due on Sunday, the tenant has Monday in which to pay. (2) That under sec. 519, Code W., the purchaser at a judicial sale is entitled to rents until redemption of property, yet he cannot recover these in advance, even though under the lease between the parties the lessor might, because of the uncertainty whether or when there may be a redemption, and if the tenant had paid rent in advance to the purchaser, he might have to answer to his landlord for the same debt after redemption. March, 1895. King county. Dunbar, J.

Gaffney v. Megrath, ib., p. 456, approves Hall v. Wilbur, 4 W. 644. That in an action for unlawful detainer, plaintiff cannot recover more than he prays for, and is not entitled to double damages under section 564 of the Code of Washington unless the same are specially claimed. March, 1895. King county. Gordon, J.

Shannon v. Grindstaff, 11 Wash. 536. This case established the doctrine that-(1) One having knowledge of a tenancy, and afterwards deals about the demised premises, the law charges him with notice of the terms thereof.

(2) That original lessor cannot collect rent of sub-tenant who has taken for a shorter term or less than the whole estate; but the land is not discharged from the claims of the original lessor who may evict, if there has been a forfeiture.

(3) That notice to surrender possession is sufficient though unsigned, though it insufficiently describes the premises, and was not served on the wife, where it appears that the sub-tenant and wife refused to surrender unless paid $75. Their lessor had surrendered

under the terms of the original lease. This is a Skagit county case, decided April, 1895. Opinion by Gordon, J.

Kohne v. White, 12 Wash. 199, was an action against the landlord by the tenant for alleged breach in the covenant in the lease for repairs to have been made by landlord. It fixes the measure of dam

ages in such cases, and is rather a damage case than a case of landlord and tenant. June, 1895. King county. Opinion by Dunbar, J.

Gilmore v. The Baker Co., ib., 468. If a case on our subject at all, dicides that notice to quit, signed by one joint executor, is sufficient notice and must be admitted in evidence in an action for unlawful detainer. The act of one of such executors being the action of all in the contemplation of the law. 1895, July. King county. Opinion by Gordon, J.

Frye v. Hill, 43 Pac., page 1907, decided February, 1896, opinion by Scott, J., is rather a case of application of payments and priority of liens than a case of landlord and tenant.

The writer has not found any other cases of landlord and tenant from our supreme court.

From the foregoing it appears that

(1) Of the whole number of cases decided, only one pertains to farming lands, the others being of tenements in the cities, and shows how extensive must be the proprietorship of those cultivating our agricultural lands.

(2) That of the cases,

Eight were from King county.
Three were from Pierce county.
Three were from Spokane county.

One from Thurston county.
One from Clallam county.

Two from Jefferson county.
One from Skagit county.

One from Snohomish county.

One from Mason county.

That there was not one case of landlord and tenant from the other twenty-five counties of the state, and that the work of preparing opinions in the decided cases was pretty evenly divided among the judges of the supreme court.

WORK OF THE SUPREME COURT ON THE LANDLORD AND TENANT.

Before closing this paper, the writer desires to say that the profession in this state, i. e., the trial courts as well as the bar, have generally taken liberties with the supreme court of the state in the liberal manner in which they have given opinions of its work, opinions which could not, all of them, have been used for the professional or official advancement of the members of that tribunal. But the writer having read carefully every case on landlord and tenant in our books, it is a pleasure now to say that the work done on the subject of landlord and tenant by our supreme court is of a most faithful and excellent character. That the opinions are compact, well expressed and satisfactory.

RECORD NOTICE AND CURATIVE ACTS.

BY ALFRED BATTLE, OF SEATTLE.

Mr. President and gentlemen of the Washington State Bar Association:

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I shall assume, in the discussion of the subject-Record Notice and Curative Acts there was not intended to be embraced any consideration of the relative merits of the system of transfer and registration of land titles, as the same generally prevails in the different states of this country, as compared with some other or different system relating to the transfer and registration of land titles; but the scope of the subject assigned to me is limited, as I view it, to a consideration only of the subject matter of notice as applied to recorded instruments and curative acts relating thereto.

It may be observed, however, that howsoever much superior and satisfactory than the rules and principles of the common law the laws of this country may be relative to the recording of various instruments and conveyances relating to realty and attaching to the same, the effect when so recorded of constructive notice, it is becoming daily more apparent how wholly unsatisfactory, cumbersome, expensive and unnecessarily complex are the titles to realty in this country.

The usage and practice of recording instruments affecting realty prevailed at an early date in America, for in 1636, in Plymouth colony, conveyances were by law required to be recorded. The practice and law of recording instruments pertaining to real estate and giving to them the force and effect of constructive notice, etc., is peculiarly of American origin and growth. Even now the registry laws of England only extend to several counties, and these laws do not give to the registration of conveyances the force and effect of notice.

Since the first registration law of Plymouth colony (1636) the idea and principle there involved became immediately epidemic.

Similar laws were passed in Connecticut in 1639; in Massachusetts in 1641; in New Jersey in 1676; in North Carolina, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Georgia in 1715 and 1755; and other and different states and territories have followed in the footsteps of those early enactments until now the system of registration of land titles prevails and has found a foothold in all of the states and territories of this country.

Whatever may be said of the wisdom of the early settlers of this country in adopting this system as compared with other systems, such as the "Torrens system," to which I shall hereafter allude, it is a sufficient tribute to the wisdom of our forefathers to say that this distinctly American system was in the nature of an advance guard to the policy and laws then or theretofore prevailing in any other country.

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In the infancy of a country, while its population is sparse and its transfers of title to realty are few, this American system is attended with few ill effects. It has in the past done much to aid the development of our great country by giving security and certainty to the purchasers of realty as compared with some other then contemporary systems, thereby enabling the frequent sale and transfer of property and the development of the country consequent thereupon. Since, however, the date of this first enactment of Plymouth colony, the different states and territories have from time to time wisely and properly, if this system is to prevail, enlarged the domain and area of recordable instruments. As an inevitable and logical result, nevertheless, of this system of registration of land titles, there has been produced results which Hamlet fittingly described as

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

The recorded instruments affecting a large portion of the real estate of some of our older, and, I might say, even newer states, have become so numerous, with the record books running into the hundreds and thousands, with so many, especially the earlier links, in the chain of title so defective, and with a hundred and one perplexing and complex questions presented for solution, and the confusion so great that I am constrained to inquire, as did not long

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