RELIGION AND RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS - TITLE TO CHURCH PROPERTY IN EVENT OF A SCHISM WITHIN A CHURCH

Authors

Michigan Law Review, University of Michigan Law School

Abstract

In 1839 property was granted to the "Trustees of the Church of Christ of Little Grove and their successors in office . . . unto the only proper use and behoof of the Church of Christ at Little Grove during a succession of trustees." A dispute arose within the congregation, causing a schism, and both the plaintiffs and the defendants claimed that they were the successors to the original trustees and that they had carried on the tenets and doctrines of the Church of Christ. The evidence showed that the defendants had been elected trustees at an open meeting presided over by a regular minister of the church, whereas the plaintiffs had been elected by a small group at a private home. The plaintiffs sought to enjoin the defendants individually and as trustees of the church from assuming ownership, control and use of the property in question. Held, injunction refused on the ground that when members of a religious congregation divide and one faction breaks away and forms a new organization, the title to the property remains in that part of the congregation which adheres to the tenets and doctrines originally taught by the congregation to whose use the property was dedicated. Little Grove Church v. Todd, 373 Ill. 387, 26 N. E. (2d) 485 (1940).

Recommended Citation

Michigan Law Review, RELIGION AND RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS - TITLE TO CHURCH PROPERTY IN EVENT OF A SCHISM WITHIN A CHURCH, 39 Mich. L. Rev. 1040 (1941).
Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol39/iss6/23