Arizona republican., 1895-08-31
AGAINST MISCEGENATION.
Test of the Arizona Statute at
 Tucson.
The First Case of the Kind Now In the Lower Courts of Pi-
 ma County.

SOSS Garcia, charged with violation of the Edmunds act, was brought up before Commissioner Chalmers yesterday. The commissioner took no action upon it, and John Wright, representing the wo- man, asked that she be discharged on her own recognizance.
 The matter was taken under advise ment until o'clock this morning.
 This case presents two interesting features and puzzle which make ones head ache trying to solve it. Pogue is supposed to be white man; Fanny Garcia is regarded as a negress. They were married about year ago, both having recently served time for the same kind of an offense with which they are now charged.
 This is the first time case involving violation of the law prohibiting mis- cegenation has ever come up in this territory, though violations of it have been frequent. The defense will con- tend that the parties are legally mar ried, and therefore there will have been no violation of the Edmunds act. The law against miscegenation is as follows |: "All marriages of persons of Caucasian blood or their descendants with negroes, Mongolians, Indians and their descend ants are null and void" The common law does not forbid such marriages and the statute being repugnant to 1t, must under the rule, be strictly construed. The whole thing then hinges on de- fnitions, and if the common theory that every person of negro blood IS 8 negro, an absurd conclusion is reach ed. For instance, mulatto is usually said to be a negro. Therefore, under the Arizona law, a mulatto, being of Caucasian blood also, cannot marry a negro, Caucasian, Chinese or an h. dian. He must be content to remain a celibate or take to wife Malay, the on- ly race the legislators forgot when they were preparing the statute.
 The common definition though and the legal definition as given by Black, are two different things. IA negro" |" he says, ''is black man a re presenta- tive of race ana the term does not usually include the mulatto." If this definition should be accepted then the purity of Fanny Garcia's negro blood comes up for investigation. She says her mother was a full blooded negress and that her father was of Spanish de- scent. Her color is jet black; her eyes and hair indicate her negro ancestry, but an almost Grecian nose and thin lips show the flow of other blood. It really makes no legal difference to what race Pogue belongs.
 The study of his blood will be a pro- fitless, hopless but interesting mental exercise. He disclaims all relationship to the Caucasian race.
 His mother, he saye, was Mayo h. dian, and his father a Cherokee. His mother, who lives in Tucson, indig- nantly denles her sons account of his ancestry. She is, she says, a pure Spaniard, and his father an Irishman. The father, who is employed at a mine near here, has been sent for. Pogue is an Irish name, and this unworthy bear CT of it looks like white man.
 This Garcia woman is social study. She is bright, and owns considerable mining property, some of which is val uable. in the Sierritas. She is quick and accurate st making bargains, and has a reputation among the business men of Tucson for extreme shrewdness A couple of years ago she hired Pogue with several other miners to work her mines in the Sier1itas. It was sool after that the relations were begun which led to their first arrest and con. yiction. The woman was sent to the county jail for forty days and Pogue got three months at Yuma. During his imprisonment, his wife, respectable
 | tained divorce from him. Immediate ly after his release his marriage to Fanny Garcia took place. The license was procured on an affidavit concerning their nationality and the ceremony wa; performed by 8 minister.
 Most other infractions of the Arizons