ASSETS (Fr. assez, enough).
All the stock in trade, cash, and all avail able property belonging to a merchant or company.
The property in the hands of an heir, executor, administrator, or trustee, which is legally or equitably chargeable with the obli gations which such heir, executor, adminis trator, or other trustee is as such, required to discharge.
Assets enter mains. Assets in hand. Such property as at once comes to the executor or other trustee, for the purpose of satisfying claims against him as such. Terms de la Ley.
Equitable assets. Such as can be reached only by the aid of a court of equity, and which are to be divided, pari passu, among all the creditors. 2 Fonblanque, 401 et seq.; Willis, Trust. 118.
Legal assets. Such as constitute the fund for the payment of debts according to their legal priority.
Assets per descent. That portion of the ancestor's estate which descends to the heir, and which is sufficient to charge him, as far as it goes, with the specialty debts of his ancestors. 2 Williams, Ex. 1011.
Personal assets. Goods and personal chat tels to which the executor or administrator is entitled.
Real assets. Such as descend to the heir, as, an estate in fee simple.
2. In the United States, generally, by statute, all the property of the deceased, real and personal, is liable for his debts, and, in equity, is to be applied as follows, when no statute prescribes a different order Of applica tion, exhausting all the assets of each class before proceeding to the next: First, the personal estate not specifically bequeathed ; second, real estate devised or ordered to be sold for the payment of debts ; third, real estate descended but not charged with debts ; fourth, real estate devised, charged generally with the payment of debts; fifth, general pecuniary legacies pro rata; sixth, real estate devised, not charged with debts. 4 Kent, Comm. 421; 2 White & T. Lead. Cas. 72.
3. With regard to the distinction between realty and personalty in this respect, growing crops go to the administrator, 7 Mass. 34; 6 N. Y. 597; so do nurseries, though not trees in general, 1 Mete. Mass. 423; 4 Cush. Maas.
380; as do bricks in a kiln, 22 Pick. Mass. 110; so do buildings held as personal pro perty by consent of the land-owner, 9 Gill & J. Md. 171; so do chattels real, as interests for years and mortgages; and hence the ad ministrator must bring the action if the mortgagor die before foreclosing, 3 A. K. Marsh. Ky. 249; so does rent, provided the intestate dies before it is due. Fixtures go to the heig, 2 Smith, Lead. Cas. 99; 11 Hurlst. & G. Exch. 114; 2 Pet. 137 ;. 6 Me. 167; 20 Wend. N. Y. 628; 9 Conn. 67. And see FIXTURES as to what are fixtures. In copy-rights and patents the administrator has right enough to get them extended and beyond the customary time. 4 How. 646, 712. The wife's paraphernalia he cannot take from her, in England, for the benefit of the children and heirs, but he may for that of creditors. In the United States, generally, the wearing-apparel of widows and minors is retained by them, and is not assets.. So among things reserved is the widow's quaran tine, i.e. forty of food and clothing. 5 N. H. 495 ; I() Pick. Mass. 430.
4. Where the assets consist of two or more funds, and at law a part of the creditors can resort to either fund, but the others can resort to one only, there courts of equity ex ercise the authority to marshal (as it is called) the assets, and by compelling the more favored creditors to exhaust first the fund upon which they have the exclusive claim, or, if they have been satisfied without the observance of this rule, by permitting the others to stand in their place, thus enable such others to receive more complete satisfac tion. 1 Story, Eq. Jur. 558 et seq.; Adams, Eq. 263, 590; Williams, Exec. 1457 ; 4 Johns. Ch. N. Y. 17 ; 1 P. Will Ch. 679; 1 Ves. Ch. 312 ; 5 Cranch, R. 35 ; 1 Johns. Ch. N. Y. 412 ; 19 Ga. 513 ; 1 Wisc. 43. See MARSHALLING OF ASSETS. See, generally, Williams, Ex. In dex; Toiler, Ex. Index ; 2 Blackstone, Comm. 510, 511; 3 Viner, Abr. 141 ; 11 id. 239; Gor don, Decedents, Index ; Ram, Assets.