Table of Contents

CHAPTER IV - OF SERVICES ESTABLISHED BY THE ACT OF MAN

 

SECTION I - OF THE DIFFERENT KINDS OF SERVICES WHICH MAY BE ESTABLISHED BY THE ACT OF MAN

Art. 49. Proprietors have a right to establish on their estates or in favor of their estates, such services as they deem proper: Provided nevertheless that the services be not imposed on the person or in favor of the person, but only on an estate or in favor of an estate, and Provided moreover, that said services imply nothing contrary to public order.
The use and extent of services thus established, are regulated by the title by which they are established, and if there be no title, by the following rules:

Art. 50. All services are established either for the use of houses or for the use of lands.
Those of the first kind are called urban services whether the buildings to which they are due be situated in the city or in the country.
Those of the second kind are called rural services.

Art. 51. All services are either perpetual or interrupted.
Perpetual services are those whose use is or may be continual without the act of man.
Such are aqueducts, common sewers, prospects and the like.
Interrupted services, are such as need the act of man to be exercised.
Such are the rights of passage, well, pasture and the like.

Art. 52. Again, services are either visible and apparent or non apparent.
Apparent services are such as are to be perceivable by exterior works, such as a door, a window, an aqueduct.
Non apparant services are such as have no exterior sign of their existence, such for instance as the prohibition of building on an estate, or of building above a particular height.

 

SECTION II - HOW SERVICES ARE ACQUIRED

Art. 53. Perpetual and apparent services may be acquired by title or by a possession of thirty years.

Art. 54. Perpetual non apparent services and interrupted services, whether apparent or not, can be established only by a title.
Immemorial possession itself is not sufficient to acquire them.

Art. 55. The intention of the father of the family is equal to a title, with respect to perpetual and apparent services.

Art. 56. The intention of the father of the family is never presumed ill it has been proved, that both estates now divided have belonged to the same proprietor and that it is by him that the things have been placed in the situation from which the services result.

Art. 57. If the proprietor of two estates between which there exist an apparent sign of service, sell one of the said estates, and if the deed of sale be silent respecting the service, the same shall continue to exist actively or passively in favor of or upon the estate which has been sold.

Art. 58. The title by which such services are established as cannot be acquired by prescription, can be replaced only by a title by which said service is acknowledged by the owner of the estate which owes the services.

Art. 59. When a service is established every thing which is necessary to use such service is supposed to be granted at the same time with the service.
Thus the service of drawing water out of a spring, carries necessarily with it the right of passage.

 

SECTION III - OF THE RIGHTS OF THE PROPRIETOR OF THE ESTATE TO WHICH THE SERVICE IS DUE

Art. 60. He to whom a service is due, has a right to make all the works necessary to use and preserve the same.

Art. 61. Said works are at his expense, and not at the expense of the owner of the estate which owes the service, unless the title by which the service is established shews the contrary.

Art. 62. Even in cases where the owner of the estate which owes the service, is bound by the title to make at his own expense the necessary works for the use and preservation of the services, he may always exonerate himself by giving up the estate which owes the service, to the owner of the estate to which the service is due.

Art. 63. If the estate for which the service has been established, comes to be divided, the service remain due for each portion, without however making worse the condition of the estate subject to the services.
Thus for instance, in case of a right of passage, all the proprietors are bound to exercise that right through the same place.

Art. 64. The proprietor of the estate which owes the service, can do nothing tending to diminish its use, or to make it more inconvenient.
Thus he cannot change the estate of the premises, nor transfer the exercise of the services to a place different from that on which it was assigned in the first instance.
Yet if this primitive assignation has become more burthensome to the proprietor of the estate which owes the service, or if he is thereby prevented from making on his estate, some advantageous repairs, he may offer to the proprietor of the other estate, a place equally convenient, for the exercise of his rights, and the owner of the estate to which the service is due cannot refuse it.

Art. 65. On the other hand, he who has a right of service, can use it only according to his title, without being at liberty to make either on the estate which owes the service, or on the estate to which the service is due, and alteration by which the condition of the first may be made worse.

 

SECTION IV - HOW SERVICES ARE EXTINGUISHED

Art. 66. Services are at an end when the things are in such a situation that they can no longer be used.

Art. 67. Services revive if the things are re-established in such a manner that they may be used, unless a sufficient time be elapsed already to give reason to suppose the extinction of the service, as is said in the following articles.

Art. 68. A right to service is extinguished by the non enjoyment of the same during thirty years.

Art. 69. The thirty years begin according to the various kinds of services, either from the day when the enjoyment of said service has ceased, in the case of an interrupted service, or from the day when an act contrary to the service has been done, in the case of a perpetual service.

Art. 70. The mode of service is subject to prescription as well as the service itself.

Art. 71. If the estate in whose favor the service is established, belongs to several, and has never been divided, the enjoyment of one bars prescription with respect to all.

Art. 72. If among the co-proprietors there be one against whom prescription cannot run, as for instance a minor, he shall preserve the right of all the others.




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