I finished the multiple choice part of the Massachusetts Bar Exam today. Now just ten essays, and by 6pm tomorrow I’ll be a free man, although not yet a lawyer. <\/p>\n
One of the basic canons of the multiple choice portion of the bar exam is “if the answer is a doctrine you’ve never heard of, it’s the wrong choice.” Unfortunately, a countervailing canon is “the bar examiners often like to use less-known synonyms for well known concepts to trick you.” (I made this canon up myself, but it’s true.) <\/p>\n
I got one of these today, and went with my intuition\/countervailing canon idea, and as I’m checking it out now, it turns out I was right. The “doctrine of after-acquired title” is<\/em> equivalent to “estoppel by deed.” Well, it’s actually not quite equivalent, because estoppel by deed only applies to prevent the grantor from denying the validity of a deed, invalid at the time of the conveyance because the grantor didn’t have good title at the time but did at a later date after the conveyance, while the doctrine of after-acquired title is good against other claimants, but it’s basically the same idea. <\/p>\n So, at least one right out of 200! <\/p>\n (How many hits will I get in the future on a google search for “doctrine of after-acquired title”<\/a>? We shall see…) <\/p>\n