The case of the duty that wasn’t
The curious case of Jacob P. Dunn There’s no doubt about it: sometimes the law is just plain confusing. And there’s good reason why reader Patricia Taylor was a little bit puzzled by the language of a legal record she came across about a man she’s...A matter of diversity
Going to federal court Genealogists love court records. They tell us all kinds of things about our families we couldn’t have found out in any other way. But with all the various courts and levels of courts that existed over the years, finding the court records...For the Record(er)
Where oh where can the records be? Reader Chris from New Jersey was busily researching a family from the Garden State when up popped a question. A member of this family had been killed in an automobile accident in New Jersey in 1934; the driver and owner of the other...Ending the poll tax
Just fifty years ago today “Imagine,” a Library of Congress website suggests that schoolchildren ask themselves, “that you are finally old enough to vote in your first election. But, do you have enough money?”1 The fact is, it was just fifty years ago today that the...Paying the Bill
Genealogy and the Bill of Rights It is one of the defining legal documents, not just of our time, but of all time. It was ratified 222 years ago yesterday. And we are all — all — the better off for it. It is the Bill of Rights. The first 10 amendments to...The maybe anniversary
The odd history of the 14th amendment Today is the 145th anniversary of the ratification of the 14th amendment. Unless maybe it wasn’t ratified until the 21st. Or maybe even the 28th. It depends on how you count, you see, and on who’s doing the counting....State Constitutions: West Virginia
Happy birthday, West Virginia! It was 150 years ago today that West Virginia became the 35th of the United States of America’s 50 states. And the only state ever admitted under such conditions — born in war, torn from secessionist Virginia in a time of...State Constitutions: Idaho
The Gem State It became a territory 150 years ago today — but it took another 27 years to win admission to the Union as the 43rd state. It is the Gem State, the “14th most expansive, the 39th most populous, and the 7th least densely populated of the 50 United...The Recorder Judge
The language of the law. Part Latin, part Anglo-Saxon, all confusing. Reader Joanne Shackford Parkes has a somewhat unsavory black sheep in her family who was involved in a court case in New York City in 1854. Allegations of abduction and seduction were met, of...Subscribe by Email
