Sell Off of Church Property

blackjack217 wrote:No, they seized the property under the legal principle of "Its a war, I can steal your property whenever I want."

The problem is, that the other side didn't recognise this, and have a legal rights to not recognise this. Especially due to the dual status of property - as the property of Church, and the property of Knights of the Temple Lands. The "wartime methods" could work during the wartime, but after the war, without official nationalisation, Charis would find a lot of headache, trying to satisfy both sides.

For example, some property in Charis was taken over by the Church of Charis as the Temple property. But after the war, some vicar appeared, and claimed that, as the Knight of the Temple Lands, he was the private owner of the property, and as a private owner, he demand his property to be compensated. What would Charis do - assuming, of course, that Inner Circle would be able to take the rising industrial-age imperialism and nationalism under control?

Dilandu wrote:

blackjack217 wrote:No, they seized the property under the legal principle of "Its a war, I can steal your property whenever I want."

The problem is, that the other side didn't recognise this, and have a legal rights to not recognise this. Especially due to the dual status of property - as the property of Church, and the property of Knights of the Temple Lands. The "wartime methods" could work during the wartime, but after the war, without official nationalisation, Charis would find a lot of headache, trying to satisfy both sides.

For example, some property in Charis was taken over by the Church of Charis as the Temple property. But after the war, some vicar appeared, and claimed that, as the Knight of the Temple Lands, he was the private owner of the property, and as a private owner, he demand his property to be compensated. What would Charis do - assuming, of course, that Inner Circle would be able to take the rising industrial-age imperialism and nationalism under control?

They'd laugh at him most likely.

That's not a principle, it's a lack of principle. One which does not extinguish property rights. Theft never does - although IIRC real property, being immovable, can't in fact be stolen.

And that statement, like most of the thread, assumes a legal regime recognisable to a common-law-trained solicitor. If Safehold is a purely statute-law regime the statutes can say whatever the drafters wanted them too - and if sale of stolen goods isn't covered or has a time limit on reclamation of the goods, the former owner could be SOL even for real property. [I'd be somewhat surprised if that were the case, but not completely]

In the case of Church property, it's possible that ownership of everything in the archdiocese is vested in the Archbishop, even when it notionally is the property of one of the Orders. In that case, as far as the EOC is concerned this is a nonissue because the Archbishops are still there Otherwise, the Empire will have to move to extinguish the COGA's property rights and convey them to the local churches - and if they forget to back-date the seizure properly, or don't think to annul any conveyance of those rights, the situation envisaged by the OP could indeed arise. How exactly this has to be done would depend a lot on the legal regime on Safehold - and it just occurred to me that the Church may not, in fact, _have_ legal title to much of its property simply because it doesn't need it. After all, who is going to challenge their right to use it? No wouldn't that be fun?

blackjack217 wrote:

Dilandu wrote:Er, actually they own this places. And legally they have rights to do that. The problem is, that someone else (Charisians) are forbade their acess to the property. But this does not nullify the Temple's rights.

No, they seized the property under the legal principle of "Its a war, I can steal your property whenever I want."

blackjack217 wrote:They'd laugh at him most likely.

And all other world would immediately assume, that in case of Charis and the Church of Charis they would eventually obtain the next Group of Four - that they would do what they like to do just because they have a power to do that. Definitely not the good publicity.

Dilandu wrote:

blackjack217 wrote:No, they seized the property under the legal principle of "Its a war, I can steal your property whenever I want."

The problem is, that the other side didn't recognise this, and have a legal rights to not recognise this. Especially due to the dual status of property - as the property of Church, and the property of Knights of the Temple Lands. The "wartime methods" could work during the wartime, but after the war, without official nationalisation, Charis would find a lot of headache, trying to satisfy both sides.

For example, some property in Charis was taken over by the Church of Charis as the Temple property. But after the war, some vicar appeared, and claimed that, as the Knight of the Temple Lands, he was the private owner of the property, and as a private owner, he demand his property to be compensated. What would Charis do - assuming, of course, that Inner Circle would be able to take the rising industrial-age imperialism and nationalism under control?

Agreed. Suppose, however, that the Empire of Charis announces that the Knights of the Temple Lands have forfeited their property as a result of launching their attack on Charis before Charis rejected the CoGA authority over it? The initial causus beli was the KotTL attack leading to Cayleb's victories at AR and Darcos.

If Charis asserts a totally secular claim on those lands as reparations for their act of aggression, they have legal standing. Further, if they kick the snot out of the CoGA, they also can claim jurisdiction as occupiers. Should Charis announce the auction of KotTL property based on this line of reasoning, there would be a few well off speculators that would take a small risk and purchase those assets at a steep enough discount.

PeterZ wrote:Agreed. Suppose, however, that the Empire of Charis announces that the Knights of the Temple Lands have forfeited their property as a result of launching their attack on Charis before Charis rejected the CoGA authority over it? The initial causus beli was the KotTL attack leading to Cayleb's victories at AR and Darcos.

If Charis asserts a totally secular claim on those lands as reparations for their act of aggression, they have legal standing. Further, if they kick the snot out of the CoGA, they also can claim jurisdiction as occupiers. Should Charis announce the auction of KotTL property based on this line of reasoning, there would be a few well off speculators that would take a small risk and purchase those assets at a steep enough discount.

Well, this may work pretty well in that case, I agree.

Dilandu wrote:

blackjack217 wrote:No, they seized the property under the legal principle of "Its a war, I can steal your property whenever I want."

The problem is, that the other side didn't recognise this, and have a legal rights to not recognise this. Especially due to the dual status of property - as the property of Church, and the property of Knights of the Temple Lands. The "wartime methods" could work during the wartime, but after the war, without official nationalisation, Charis would find a lot of headache, trying to satisfy both sides.

For example, some property in Charis was taken over by the Church of Charis as the Temple property. But after the war, some vicar appeared, and claimed that, as the Knight of the Temple Lands, he was the private owner of the property, and as a private owner, he demand his property to be compensated. What would Charis do - assuming, of course, that Inner Circle would be able to take the rising industrial-age imperialism and nationalism under control?

None of the Church property was owned by the (nominally secular) KoTL. It was all owned outright by the Church of God Awaiting. Guess what happened to the elements of the CoGA in Charis? They renamed themselves the Church of Charis and retained the Church properties, except for the Temple Loyalist parish churches and rectories. There might be a few Temple Loyalist Convents or Abbeys.

As far as the Empire is concerned, the CoGA no longer has any legal claim on the Church properties the Church of Charis took over. The Church properties within the Empire that open Temple Loyalists are running/managing/working out of, however, are more of a gray area and it could be argued that the CoGA could sell those Church properties. If the Temple Loyalists protested, I still wouldn't want to lay odds on what the civil courts with jurisdiction (meaning local/Imperial Charisian ones) would rule.


Frankly, unless the Empire looses, buying Church properties within the Empire from the CoGA is not the way you want to be spending your money.
The CoGA can try to sell anything it wants, but it's not going to mean the current owners (Church of Charis) or local legal authorities (Empire of Charis) are going to recognize the sales as valid.
It'd be like the Catholic Church trying to sell lands it had owned that are currently in the hands of the Anglican Church to finance a Catholic restoration (and Catholic country-sponsored invasion, such as Spain) in Protestant England. You could give the Catholic Church as much money as you wanted, but unless they succeeded, all you have to show for your money is a bunch of paper and hot air that nobody (who is in authority) in England is going to care.

Kytheros wrote:None of the Church property was owned by the (nominally secular) KoTL. It was all owned outright by the Church of God Awaiting. Guess what happened to the elements of the CoGA in Charis? They renamed themselves the Church of Charis and retained the Church properties, except for the Temple Loyalist parish churches and rectories. There might be a few Temple Loyalist Convents or Abbeys.

Again, it would make happy a lot of generations of layers, that would be hired to negotiate this disput. If it wasn't de jure nationalisation of the property, than the legal status is doubtful. What means "renamed themselves the Church of Charis and retained the Church properties"? In that case, if someone renamed himself The Grand Overlord of Church of Old Charis and claimed the main Tesselberg cathedral as his own property, this would be legal? I doubt that.

The problem is, that - by the Safeholdian point of view - all this legal situation is unprecedent. During wartime the situation would not be the main point of view, but when the war ended...

Dilandu wrote:

Kytheros wrote:None of the Church property was owned by the (nominally secular) KoTL. It was all owned outright by the Church of God Awaiting. Guess what happened to the elements of the CoGA in Charis? They renamed themselves the Church of Charis and retained the Church properties, except for the Temple Loyalist parish churches and rectories. There might be a few Temple Loyalist Convents or Abbeys.

Again, it would make happy a lot of generations of layers, that would be hired to negotiate this disput. If it wasn't de jure nationalisation of the property, than the legal status is doubtful. What means "renamed themselves the Church of Charis and retained the Church properties"? In that case, if someone renamed himself The Grand Overlord of Church of Old Charis and claimed the main Tesselberg cathedral as his own property, this would be legal? I doubt that.

The problem is, that - by the Safeholdian point of view - all this legal situation is unprecedent. During wartime the situation would not be the main point of view, but when the war ended...

When the war ends, either Charis has lost, in which case the buyers get the properties, or what's left after the conquest of the Empire, or Charis is victorious, in which case, it is highly unlikely that Imperial Courts will recognize the CoGA's sale of Church of Charis properties as valid transactions (the CoGA would effectively have been committing fraud), and probably won't recognize the sale of any contested Temple Loyalist Church properties within the Empire either.

I wonder if Safehold lawyers have any maxim comparable to "In time of war the law falls silent".

They might not given that their source of law is a global and (formerly) universally recognized Church.