Legitimacy (law)
In common law, legitimacy is the status of a child born to parents who are legally married to each other; and of a child that is born soon after the parents' divorce. Conversely, illegitimacy (or bastardy) is the status of a child conceived outside marriage. The consequences of illegitimacy have pertained mainly to a child's rights of inheritance to the putative father's estate and the child's right to bear the father's surname or title. Illegitimacy has also had consequences for the mother's and child's right to support from the putative father. (See Affiliation (family law).)
Read more about Legitimacy (law): Law, Nomenclature, Contemporary Position, Extramarital Births, History, Social Implications, In Popular Culture, Notable People
Famous quotes containing the word legitimacy:
“In New York—whose subway trains in particular have been “tattooed” with a brio and an energy to put our own rude practitioners to shame—not an inch of free space is spared except that of advertisements.... Even the most chronically dispossessed appear prepared to endorse the legitimacy of the “haves.””
—Gilbert Adair, British author, critic. “Cleaning and Cleansing,” Myths and Memories (1986)