IN PERSO'NAM (Lat.. against a person). In the classification of legal rights• a right in per sunont is cue ;IV:111;11)k against a particular per son as distinguished from one maintainable against the whole world. known as a right in run (q.v.). Rights in pet-sonata arise out of specitie engagements entered into by individuals or out of duties imposed on individuals by the policy of the law. They thus comprehend all contract rights, the rights that arise out of the domestic relations or out of fiduciary or official position. Thus, the right to the performance of a contract the right of a husband to the society of his wife, the right of a beneficiary against a trustee, in each ease asserted against a determi nate person, are all rights in prrsonam. But by far the largest class of these right: is that which springs from the violation of other right:, whether rights in on! mr in inrsonnin. A right once violated—whether a right of property by a trespass, or the right of personal security by an assault, or a contract right by a breach of contract—a right of action arises, and this right of action. being limited to the person or persons committing the act complained of is necessarily a right in in •snnam. Conscill the
authorities referred to under TORT; CONTRACT ; and the commentaries of Kent and 111:lel:stone.
The expression in pi rsnan m is also eommonly employed to describe the action instituted for the violation of any right. whether in nin or in per Wherever an action is brought against an individual, whether for damages or for the restitution of money or specific property, it is properly described as all :lotion in in•rxnnorn. The action in rein is in our law limited to a nar row range of cases. (See IN IZENt.1 The phrase in personnin is also employed in a narrower sense to describe the mode in which a legal obligation is enforced against an individual. The courts of chancery are said to act in perRnnam. i.e. by or dering a person to do or to refrain from doing a certain thing, while courts of law, whose fungi 6011 14 /Mt, to eonimand, but to adjudicate eon troversies, ale said to act in rem. Svc. ClIANCTI.. 1,OR ; COANt EltY, err ol.' ; ;Olt horit if., referred to under PinnEnt..111..