“Psychic Phenomena and the Law”

Couldn't access the article on psychic mediums mentioned by the Wills, Trusts and Estates Prof, but the effort led me to a gem, Blewett Lee's 1921 Harvard Law Review article, Psychic Phenomena and the Law. 

Lee discusses cases involving ghosts, like the spirit of Thomas Harris. When Harris' will was questioned, endangering his children's inheritance, his ghost repeatedly pestered William Brigs and gave Brigs a message for Harris' brother, reminding him that they had discussed how the estate should be managed in the best interests of the children. The brother complied. (Why the ghost didn't speak directly to the brother is not explained.)

In the 1920's magical writing, seances and such were in vogue. Lee wrote that messages from the dead deserved respect.

In determining what legal effect is to be given to spiritualistic communications believed to be genuine by the recipient, the communications should be treated for legal purposes as if the supposed communicators had still survived, and made the communications. *** 

If, for example, a person believes that his dead mother told him to make a certain devise, the communication should be dealt with, so far as the believer is concerned, as if it had in fact been made by his mother. 

"The more importance is given to these communications," Lee explained, "the easier it will be to break wills or contracts made under their control."

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Son of a Confederate general, Blewett Lee was notable in his own right. After Harvard Law School, he won appointment as clerk to a United States Supreme Court Justice. "He was the only clerk not to have attended an elite preparatory school, the only one not a graduate of Harvard College, and the only law clerk from south of the Mason-Dixon Line."

Some ghosts can fly, but that probably doesn't explain Blewett Lee's interest in early aviation law.

Blewett’s ideas and methodology concerning aerial laws, published nearly a century earlier, remain influential today. In a 2012 article referencing the legal issues posed by the popularity of drones, Dr. Timothy T. Takahashi of Arizona State University cited Blewett’s work as a viable model for current drone regulations.

The Internet has its flaws and its trolls, but I'm grateful for the introduction to Blewett Lee.