Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 11.pdf/437

 4o4

THE LAW OF THE LAND. XI. WHAT'S IX A NAME? By W1ll1am Arch. McClean.

WHAT'S in a name? That depends on a great many things, for instance the size of the deposit to the credit of the name. If the name on the end of the check happens to be any one of the multi-mil lionaires that encumber the earth, the payee is fortunate in proportion to the size of the check. If however the name on the check should be the plain one of John Doe, who overdrew his account yesterday, then the last state of that name would be worse than the former. Fools by any other names would exhibit the same folly, and what fools we mortals be when it comes to the writing of names. We scribble them everywhere, cut them with our jack-knives on the highest branches of trees or on the topmost point of some steeple, or chisel them upon rocks, or put them on the back of negotiable paper for sweet friend ship's sake and lose thereby a friend and win a debt. A rose by any other name would smell as sweet, and our friends the Joneses, Browns and Smiths can well be satisfied that they would be just as distinguished, illustrious and numerous, as they now are, if they were called Johnsons, Brownsons and Smythers. It would only be the same old wine put in to new bottles. We are presented with our names without the asking for them, without even our con sent thereto, when we start in life, and many a Liz mourns her whole life because she was not named Ophelia, and many a Peter swears intermittently because he was not born a Reginald. The names we are punished with, we use as branding irons for as much of this

world's possessions as we can gather together and then when we part with the name we use it to scatter that which was gathered. One doesn't always have to stick to one name, he or she can support an alias if l1e or she choose, and he or she can get himself or herself legally bound as easily with the alias as with his or her own name. The name of Mark Twain on a check would be just as good as Samuel L. Clemens and a recovery had against the man who wrote it, for the courts have said if a man is baptized by one name and known by another, a grant by the name by which he is known shall be good. You need not even write your name to bind yourself, you can just make a mark, a cross, an X, and you will be fast. You may or may not designate it as your mark, or an other may or may not write his name along side of your mark as a witness, yet you are bound if it can be proved that you made the mark with the intention of binding your self. It makes no difference whether you made the mark by reason of the existence of a dense ignorance or being a university graduate you made use of it as a freak. A court has refused to allow proof of ability to write in the face of the fact that the mark was made, saying the fact of being able to write would make no difference, for a person may be come bound by any mark or designation he thinks proper to adopt, provided it be used as a substitute for his name and he intends to bind himself. It is not necessary for you to use the only old rusty pen you have in the house, moist ened by the few watered drops of ink found