Spencer Heath Archives

Item 791

Recollected by Spencer MacCallum from conversation with Heath

February 1956?

/Ceremony about titles is so the people will all know about it. Formal title of an automobile is for a different purpose than title to land, however. In this case it is merely an important piece of property. This was the reason given when government bodies first started requiring registration of automobile titles. It was considered to be a protection of the owner. Now it has come to be the means of regulating and controlling the owner. It would be more satisfactory for everyone if this had not got started. With respect to land, however, ceremony in regard to title is another matter. It is important that people know who their officers are (this was especially true historically in Anglo-Saxon England). This also accounts for why it is a fixed principle at law in regard to land that there can never be a hiatus in the ownership of land; there must always be an owner./