## Facts

- Henry Blood Jr. died owning multiple parcels of real property and left a will devising his entire estate to his widow, Margaret E. Blood (later Morse), in fee simple.
- The devise granted the widow full control and power to dispose of the property, but imposed a condition that she could not “give or bequeath one cent” of the estate to any member of the testator’s family or to any of her own relatives.
- The testator’s heirs at law (including Thomas Laughton Blood) asserted that the condition created a condition subsequent and that they held a right of entry if the widow ever violated it.
- The widow brought a statutory action to determine adverse claims to the real estate.
- The heirs’ answer relied on the condition as the basis for their claimed future forfeiture right.
- The widow demurred, contending the condition was void and the answer stated no defense or counterclaim.
- The district court sustained the demurrer, and the heirs appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether a condition attached to a fee-simple devise that forbids the devisee from giving or bequeathing any part of the estate to relatives of the testator or the devisee is void as an unlawful restraint on alienation.
2. If the condition is void, whether the heirs can assert a right of entry for condition broken as a defense in an action to determine adverse claims.

## Decision

- The Minnesota Supreme Court affirmed the order sustaining the demurrer.
- The court held the widow took a fee-simple estate apart from the condition.
- The condition was void as an impermissible restraint on alienation because its practical effect substantially impaired marketability.
- Because the condition was void, the heirs’ alleged right of entry failed, and their answer stated no valid defense or counterclaim.

## Legal Principles

- A fee-simple estate carries an incident power of disposition; conditions that substantially restrict alienation are disfavored and may be void as against public policy.
- Even a restraint framed as a prohibition on transfer to a class of persons can be void if, in operation, it creates a continuing cloud on title and makes property effectively unmarketable.
- When a purported condition subsequent is void, no right of entry can arise from its breach, and claims premised solely on that condition fail as a matter of law.

## Conclusion

The court held that the will’s “no relatives” condition, though phrased as a limitation on dispositions to certain persons, operated to chill transfers and impair title across multiple parcels, making it an unlawful restraint on alienation; the widow’s fee-simple title therefore stood free of the condition, and the heirs had no enforceable right of entry.


Morse v. Blood, 71 N.W. 682 (Minn. 1897)