In all the colonies, the lands were granted to the colonial proprietors to hold in free and common socage; the services reserved consisting sometimes of a nominal rent, and sometimes there being merely the incident of fealty to mark the feudal relation.30 After the Revolution, the feudal position of paramount lord, previously occupied by the crown, presumably passed to the state with the other sovereign rights,31 since, as stated by a most competent authority, "it does not seem that so fundamental an alteration in the theory of property as the abolition of tenure would be worked by a change of political sovereignty. Tenure still obtains between a tenant for life or years and the reversion; and so, in like manner, it is conceived a tenant in fee simple holds of the chief lord,-that is, of the state."32 The same writer, however, enumerates a number of states in which, in view of the statutes or particular judicial decisions, tenure must be regarded as nonexistent.33 In this latter class of states, the statute of Quia Emptores is, of course, not in force, since, in the absence of tenure, the statute is meaningless. In the other states, however, where, as stated above, there seems good reason to assume the existence of tenure, this statute is probably in force, with the exception only of Pennsylvania and South Carolina, and consequently, except in those two states, all tenure, so far as existent, must be directly of the state.34

26. Leake, Prop. in Land, 19, 317; Challis, Real Prop. 18, 20.

27. 2 Blackst. Comm. 92; Dig-by, Hist. Real Prop. 233; Williams, Real Prop. 119. Occasionally, manors have been created since that date by special license from the crown. Challis, Real Prop. 22.

28. 1 Pollock & Maitland, Hist. Eng. Law, 336.

29. Digby, Hist. Real Prop. c. 39, 2 Blackst. Comm. 76; Challis, Real Prop. 23.

30. 1 Story, Const. Law, Sec. 172.