By the American system of registration deeds of conveyance of any interest in lands, when duly recorded in conformity with the law of the State where such land is situate, have the dignity and effect of records, and to them much of the stability of our land titles is attributable. Such record not only serves as a means of preservation of the muniments and evidences of title, but also has the effect of giving to the transfer that notoriety formerly obtained by livery of seizin, to which it is made equivalent in some of the States by statute. The statutes of registration bear a close similitude in all the States, and provide generally for the recording of every instrument in writing by which any estate or interest in land is created, aliened, mortgaged or assigned, or by which the title to land may be affected either in law or in equity.

18 Cambridge Bank vs. Delano, 48

N. Y., 326. 19 Tankard vs. Tankard, 79 N. C, 54.

20 Pomeroy vs. Stevens, 11 Met. (Mass.), 244.

It is a general provision of the recording acts, that every conveyance which shall not be recorded as provided by law, shall be void against any subsequent purchaser in good faith, and for a valuable consideration, of the same land, or any portion thereof, whose deed of conveyance shall be first duly recorded; and further, that every instrument recorded in the manner prescribed by statute, shall, from the time of filing same for record, impart notice to all persons of the contents thereof. As previously remarked, however, the constructive notice afforded by the record of a deed, applies only to those who are bound to search for it; as subsequent purchasers, and all others who deal with or on the credit of the title, in the line of which the recorded deed belongs. That such record imparts notice is to be understood also, in the sense that the contents of the deed are correctly spread upon the record, for the recording acts cannot be made by equitable construction to embrace cases not within them, or give constructive notice of things the records do not show.

It would further seem, that instruments to impart notice, must be recorded in the proper books. Thus, where separate books are provided for deeds and mortgages it has, in some instances, been held that a mortgage recorded in a book of deeds will not furnish constructive notice.21 So, also, the registry of an instrument not required by law to be recorded is notice to no one,22 and, usually, a deed is not constructive notice merely because it is copied into the registry if it has not been duly executed, acknowledged or proved, so as to entitle it to registration,23 although such an instrument would be effective as to all persons who have actual notice of its contents.24

Registration, in legal intendment, is conclusive notice to the parties to be affected by it. But notice of a prior unrecorded deed, communicated to a purchaser, will prevail over a subsequent recorded deed, and as between the immediate parties no registration is necessary, an unrecorded deed having the effect to convey the legal title as against all persons having actual notice of its existence.25