Word: laws
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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...Some of the money which he gave her she spent upon a Negro man whose wife threatened court action unless much more money was forthcoming. The triangle crashed and last year Letitia Ernestine Brown sued Mr. Curtis for separation and $250 per week alimony, claiming she was his common-law wife. A Manhattan judge decided their relationship was purely meretricious and illicit, dismissed the suit. Mr. Curtis, declaring his "life was ruined," vanished "to get away from...
Between these two cases, as in a twilight zone, lies the treacherous field of common-law marriage. Only the hairline of intent divides such a legal union from the lover-mistress relationship...
States by statutes have decreed who shall be competent to marry, what persons shall be competent to perform marriage ceremonies. These laws are generally considered directory, not mandatory, and a marriage outside the statutory law−i.e., under common or unwritten law−is by implication a legal exception, quite valid if the faith and intent behind the contract are good. Common-law marriages are recognized by the courts of most of the older States east of the Mississippi. Some of the newer States by statute expressly prohibit such unions. No nonstatutory marriage can be positively stamped as valid until...
...sound common-law marriage is usually composed of: 1) a man and a woman both legally competent to make the contract (age, absence of other matrimonial obligations, etc.); 2) their actual and mutual agreement to enter the union faithfully, permanently, to the exclusion of all others; 3) their cohabitation; 4) the length of time they live together (varying in practice from one to seven years); 5) their public and social conduct as man and wife. Children by such a union, the existence of a settled home, and the community's recognition, all tend strongly to confirm the relationship...
Into the courts come infinite circumstantial variations of the common-law marriage, most of them confused in intent and darkened by deliberate secrecy. Courts generally hold that the good faith of one party sustains such a union, regardless of the mental reservations of the other. Promiscuity, neglect, cruelty, etc., open the door to legal separation as in any statutory marriage. The secrecy usual in a lover-mistress relationship prevents its becoming a common-law marriage unless time dispels the cloak and establishes public and personal acceptance of the union...