BIGAMY. The wilfully contracting a second marriage when the contracting party knows that the first is still subsisting.
The state of a man who has two wives, or of a woman who has two husbands, living at the same time.
When the man has more than two wives, or the woman more than two husbands, living at the same time, then the party is said to have committed polygamy; but the name of bigamy is more fre quently given to this offence in legal proceedings. 1 Russell, Crimes, 187.
According to the canonists, bigamy is threefold, viz.: (vera, interpretativa, et eimilitadinaria). real, interpretative, and similitudinary. The first con sisted in marrying two wives successively (virgins they may be), or in once' marrying a widow ; the second not in a repeated marriage, but in marrying (v. g. ineretrieeto vet ab alio corruptone) a harlot; the third arose from two marriages, in deed, but the one metaphorical or spiritual, the other carnal. This last was confined to persons initiated in sacred orders, or under the vow of con tinence. Deferriere's Tract. Jaris Canon. tit. xxi. See also Bacon. Abr. Marriage.
2. In England this crime is punishable by the stat. 1 Jac. I. c. 11, which makes the offence felony ; but it from punish ment the party whose husband or wife shall continue to remain absent for seven years before the second marriage without being heard from, and persons who shall have been legally divorced. The statutory provisions in the United States against bigamy or poly gamy are in general similar to, and copied from, the statute of 1 Jac. I. c. 11, excepting as to the punishment. The several excep
tions to this statute are also nearly the same in the American statutes ; but the punish ment of the offence is different in many of the states. 2 Kent, Comm. 69.
3. If a woman, who has a husband living, marries another person, she is punishable, though her husband has voluntarily with drawn from her and remained absent and unheard of for any term of time less than seven years, and though she honestly believes, at the time of her second marriage, that he is dead. 7 Mete. Mass. 472. On the trial of a woman for bigamy whose first husband had been absent from her for more than seven years, the jury found that they had no evi dence that at the time of her second mar riage she knew that he was alive, but that she had the means of acquiring knowledge of that fact had she chosen to make use of them. It was held that upon this finding the conviction could not be supported. 1 Dearsl. & B. Cr. Cas. 98. If a man is prose cuted for bigamy, his first wife cannot be called to prove her marriage with the defend ant. T. Raym. 1; 2 Taylor, Ev. 1228.
4. Where the first marriage was made abroad, it must be shown to have been valid where made. 5 Mich. 349. Reputation is not sufficient to establish the fact of the first marriage. 1. Park. Cr. Cas. N. Y. 378. See 13 Ired. No. C. 289. If the second marriage be in a foreign state, it is not bigamy, 2 Park. Cr. Cas. N. Y. 195; except by sta tute. 36 Eng. L. & Eq. 614. The second marriage need not be a valid one. 1 Carr. & K. 144.