The Washington times., 1921-03-21

ST|LLMAN BOY
Law Puts Burden of Proof That
Child Is Guides Son Up
To Banker.

uon OF the paternity OF baDy Guy
Stillman has led to a wide discussion
OF tho law of legitimacy.
Following are pertinent quotations
as set forth in corpus 'juris from the
law library of Supreme Court Justice
Gorschauser at Poughkeepsie:
Subsequent marriage OF parents:
The civil and canon law, in con-
tradistinction to the common law, az
lowed the subsequent marriage OF tn.
parents to legitimate previously born
issue. Following this rule, large
majority of the United States have
Rbrogated the common law doctrine
and enacted that a subsequent inter-
marriage Of the parents, followed by
cohabitation and accompanied by an
acknowledgment of paternality on the
= part of the father. shall legitimate
previous issue.
"UnIess the language Of the stat
ute requires it. 1t is unnecessary that
the man shall be in fact the father
of the child. Such statutes, being
remedial, should be received with a
liberal construction and are general
ly held to extend to the issue OF an
adulterous intercourse, although the
contrary has also been held.
OPERATE RESPECTIVELY.
These statutes also have been held
to operate in respective sense to the
extent OF legitimating those whose
parents had married before the pas
sage of the act, but have been held
} not to affect the property relations of
husband and wife"
Effect of legitimation:
I'm the absence of restrictions in
the statutes, the legitimation places
an illegitimate child, as far as inher-
liable blood is concerned. on the same
= footing as offspring born in lawful
wedlock. This status of the child will
obtain everywhere, and no act or
statement of the father or mother can
thereafter change it,"
What law governs?
THE general current Of modern au-
thority favors the doctrine that,
where An illegitimate child has been
held legitimate, such legitimacy fol-
lows the child wherever it may go,
7 and entities it to all the rights flow-
ing from such statutes, including the
right to inherit"
MUST PROVE CHARGE.
With reference to the question OF
the alleged iliegitimacy of Guy
Stillman, the same authority says:
rPresumptions.
"A child is presumed to be legiti-
mate until the contrary is showr
in case Of conflicting presumptions,
that in favor OF legitimacy will pre-
vail. Every child born in wedlock
" law Is presumed to be legitimate.
even though it may be shown also
that the wife during the time was
guilty of infidelity. So firm was the
presumption originally that it could
not be rebutted unless the husbar d
was incapable Of procreation or was
absent beyond the four seas during
the'whole period of the wife's preg-
nancy.
"This rule was repudiated more
than a century ago, and gave way
to the modern doctrine that the pre-
sumption may be rebutted by any
competent and relevant witness that
the husband could not have been TIE
father of the child"
After lapse of time:
"The fact that an assumed legiti-
macy has remained uncontroverted
for a great length of time strength
ems the presumption regarding it.
BURDEN OF PROOF.
Burden Of proof where the cir
cumstances are such as to give rise
to presumption OF legitimacy.
Those who assume the fact OF ille-
gitimacy have cast on them the bur-
den of establishing it,"
'A0misSDlllty.
'In order to render testimony ad-
nissible to overthrow the presump-
ton OF legitimacy. it must have a
tendency. in a reasonable mind to es-
tablish some circumstance which is
, regarded as sufficient for this pur-
pose. Mere reputation of wife for
unchastity, especially where such
reputation was before marriage or
after the birth of the child. has no
such tendency and is inadmissible. so.
as a rule. evidence of her unchaste
conduct with other men is inadmissi-
BILE unless IL relates closely to the
period when the child was begotten.
But in some jurisdictions such
evidence has been admitted at least
where 1t is offered merely as cor
roborating evidence of nonaccess. Evil
dence OF the husbands nonaccess at
the time that the child was begotten
and of his frequent quarrels with his
xuifA In N ha oh