Adams v. Sneed

Citations

• 41 Fla. 151

Syllabus

<p>1. In the absence of enabling statutes, the issue of customary slave marriages, which terminated before, or were never ratified by the parties thereto after emancipation, possess no inheritable blood under our statutes of descent.</p> <p>2. General emancipation was not retroactive so as to infuse inheritable blood into those who did not possess it before emancipation; nor did it render valid customary slave marriages contracted before, but not ratified or confirmed after emancipation; nor does general emancipation authorize the courts to place the children of customary slave marriages which terminated before, or were never ratified by the parties after, emancipation upon the plane of the legitimate issue of legal marriages, within the meaning of statutes of descent.</p> <p>3. Children of customary slave marriages which terminated before, or were never ratified by the parties thereto after, emancipation, are neither legitimates or bastards within the meanings of our statutes of descent; they simply have no status one way or the other. The case of Williams vs. Kimball, 35 Fla. 49, 16 South. Rep. 783, in, so far as it holds that such children are placed in the same category as bastards,, and that it is proper to give them the benefit of any legislation adding to the inheritable capacity of bastards, overruled.</p> <p>4. Chapter 1566, act approved December 12, 1866, was repealed by sections 4 and 6, Article VIII, and section 1, Article XV, Constitution of 1868, and reenactment of said Chapter as section 1829, Revised Statutes, is in conflict with Article XII, Constitution of 1885, and therefore void. (Taylor, C. J., dissenting.)</p>