The Heirship System,

There is no absolute freedom in the law. Necessary limit of freedom conforms to the inevitable demand of modern law. The freedom of testament which is the basic principle of countries all over the world in the law of succession is not excepting. Even in Britain, where advocates right supremely, also imposes restrictions on freedom of testament. Intergrating the law of succession in the world, the limit to the freedom of testament mainly achieves through the system of forced share. In order to protecting the interests of close relatives better, the system of forced share requires that ancestor must leave the part of heritage in the family. It is consistent with the community's traditional ethics and legal value of justice.In current law of succession of our country, freedom of testament is limited and primarily embodies in article 19 which provides that testaments should leave necessary share of heritage to the heirs who lack source of livelihood and labor capacity. This is the system of necessary share of heritage in our country. It is certainly worth that the system of necessary share of heritage plays a positive role in the protection of the vulnerable heirs and reducing social burdens. But compared to the system of forced share, the system of necessary share of heritage has serious limitations. It particularly reflects that after ancestor retains the. appropriate heritage to the heirs who lack the source of livelihood and labor capacity, ancestor can disciplinary surplus property through testament and do not leave any legacy to other close relatives. It seriously damages the interests of close relatives and violates our ethical norms and social reality demands. Choicing this topic is to conduct a comparative study on the system of forced share and hope the establishment of this system in our law of succession as early as possible.The main body of the text divides into four parts except introduction and concluding remarks, as follows:The first part is profile of the system of forced share. The text introduces the history of the system in the first place. The duty share in Roman law and the expecting share in ancient Genman law are the predecessor of forced share. Since then the system of forced share was inherited by civil law countries such as Germany and France. At the same time, common law...