Page:Race distinctions in American Law (IA racedistinctions00stepiala).pdf/95

 FEDERAL LEGISLATION

The Congress of the United States has had occasion to pass upon the validity of slave marriages only in connection with pensions to the descendants of colored soldiers. An act[33] of 1873 provided that, in determining whether the widow of a Negro or Indian soldier and sailor is entitled to a pension, it is necessary only for the claimants to show that she was married according to some ceremony, which she and the deceased deemed obligatory, that they habitually recognized each other as husband and wife, and were so recognized by their neighbors, and that they lived together up to the date of his enlistment. It was also provided that the children of such marriages might claim their father's pension.

Though they proceeded in different ways, practically all of the States arrived at the same result. If slaves were married according to the custom, if they lived as husband and wife both before and after Emancipation, their union was considered a valid marriage to all intents and purposes and the children thereof might inherit. Where the procurement of a certificate or remarriage was required, if one of the parties took advantage of the opportunity to be freed from the early alliance, as happened in several amusing instances, and took another spouse, the second marriage was the valid one, and the children of the slave union could not inherit their parents' property.

It scarcely needs to add that, at present, the marriage requirements as to license, age, etc., are in all States precisely the same both for white and colored people.