Jackson v. Jackson

Citations

• 80 Md. 176
• 30 A. 752
• 1894 Md. LEXIS 131

Syllabus

<p>Proof of Marriage and Legitimacy — General Reputation — Instructions to the fury — Evidence—Depositions.</p> <p>Marriage may be proved by general reputation, cohabitation and acknowledgement in all cases, except actions for criminal conversation and prosecutions for bigamy.</p> <p>The declarations of deceased parents are competent evidence to prove the legitimacy of their children, as well as to proye their marriage at a particular time and place, but evidence that the man did not tell an intimate friend that he was married or had a child, is not admissible.</p> <p>Where the evidence as to the general reputation concerning the marriage n of the parties in question is conflicting, it is competent for the jury to find the reputation according to the evidence of the plaintiff, but it is error in such case to instruct the jury that upon the evidence the law presumes that the parties were lawfully married, and the burden of proof is upon the defendant to show that they were not. Every fact stated in the prayer might have been found to be true, and yet the jury might properly have refused to sustain the marriage, because there was evidence qualifying these facts and tending to throw discredit and suspicion upon the cohabitation between the parties.</p> <p>If a marriage can be justly inferred from the facts, then the presumption is that it was lawfully contracted wherever it may have taken place, and it will make no difference if it be shown that by the law of the State where it was contracted, the same ceremony is not requisite which is prescribed by the law of this State. But the Court cannot take judicial notice of the law of another State, and no instruction to the jury concerning the same should be granted in the absence of evidence as to that law.</p> <p>Where it is attempted to prove a marriage by a general reputation, cohabitation and acknowledgment, the instructions on the one side ought to put clearly before the jury the facts in evidence from which they would