Case ID: mass_7/html/0074-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "* By the Court.\n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

*The Inhabitants of Medway versus The Inhabitants of Natick.
    A mulatto is a person begotten between a white and black.
    The issue of such a person and a white is not a mulatto.
    Assumpsit for moneys expended by the plaintiffs in the support and maintenance of one Roba Vickons, a pauper, alleged by the plaintiffs to have had her legal settlement in Natick, and a child of the said Roba.
    
    The parties agreed that judgment should be rendered on the following facts: —
    The pauper is the daughter of Ishmael Coffee, of Medway. The said Ishmael is half black and half white. His wife, who is the mother of Roba, the pauper, is a white woman; the said Roba was married to one Christopher Vickons, of Natick, a white person, August 6, 1789, by the Rev. Stephen Badger, of said Natick. The said Christopher is dead, and at the time of his death had his legal settlement in the said town of Natick. The said Roba, and her child by the said Christopher, are residing in Medway, are poor and indigent, and have been relieved by the said town of Med-way, &c.
    If, upon these facts, it should be the opinion of the Court that the said Roba is a mulatto, within the meaning of the “ Act for the more orderly consummation of marriages,”  and that the said act, so far as it relates to a prohibition of marriage between a white person and a mulatto, and declaring the same to be null and void, is constitutional, then the plaintiffs agree to become nonsuit But !f the Court should be of opinion that the said Roba is not i mu« lotto, or that the said act, so far as it relates to prohibiting the marriage of a white person with a mulatto, &c., is unconstitutional, then the defendants agree to be defaulted, and that judgment shall be rendered for the plaintiffs for the sum demanded by them.
    
      Hastings for the plaintiffs.
    
      J. Richardson for the defendants.
    
      
      
        Stat. I786, c. 3, § 7,
    
   * By the Court.

Two questions are referred to our [ * 89 ] decision in this case.— 1. Whether the legislature had authority, within the constitution, (the parties probably intending the declaration of rights prefixed to the constitution,) to declare a marriage of a white person with a mulatto to be absolutely null and void. It is unnecessary for us to declare any opinion we may have formed upon this question; as our opinion upon the second question, viz. whether the pauper is a mulatto, is sufficient for the decision of this action. And it is our unanimous opinion, that a mulatto is a person begotten between a white and a black. This is the definition given by the best lexicographers, and we believe it also to agree with the popular use of the term. The pauper’s father, in this case, was a mulatto, and her mother was a white woman. The pauper is then not a mulatto. According to the agreement of the parties, there must be judgment for the plaintiffs.

Defendants defaulted. 
      
      
         [In Spanish mulato, and in French mulatre, have the same meaning. — Ed.]