ILLEGITIMACY (from Lat. in-, not gitinins, legal, front lex, law). According to the civil and statute law as found in many States, the status of children born out of wedlock. In England, children born out of wedlock have been held as illegitimate even upon subsequent inter marriage of the parents; also children of the deceased wife's sister have long been considered illegitimate. In Italy, much confusion has arisen as to legitimacy, owing to the strife between Church and State. it has been held that chil dren resulting from marriages which had been solemnized by the Church only were illegitimate, is civil marriage being necessary to give legiti macy to offspring.
In New York the children of a man and woman cohabiting professedly as husband and wife have been hold to he legitimate. In France, where informal unions are common, the same rule does not. hold. Children of such a are considered illegitimate. A great. variety exists as to theory and practice in different lands, and reference must be made to speeial treatises on the subject. Illegitimacy has been much discussed from three distinct points of view—the moral, the economic, and the legal.
For the student of morals and social reformer the causes and effects of illegitimacy form the leading points of observation. That the number of illegitimates justifies consideration, the pre ceding statistics on- the general situation may give sufficient evidence.* Of all subjects for statistical investigation, illegitimacy presents perhaps the most difficul ties, owing to the lack of agreement among dif ferent legal authorities as to what constitutes illegitimacy, and to the fact that it is a pile nonunion naturally subject to concealment. Com plete figures up to date cannot be secured; it appears, however, that in civilized lands children born out of wedlock vary from 3 per cent. to 12 per cent. of all births. In most cases figures on illegitimacy exclude still-births. Of the latter the number equals about one-third of the illc gitimates.
Attempts have been made to demonstrate sta tistically the causes of illegitimacy, but with little success. The study, for instance, of the fecundity of women throws very little light upon it. In Russia, in 1896, the number of births
to 10 marriages was 65, while the number of illegitimates was only 31 to 1000 births. During the same period in France there were only 27 births to 10 marriages, with 88 illegitimate births per 1000. In Austria there were 44 births to 10 marriages, and 145 illegitimates per 1000 births, and England showed about 36 births to 10 marriages and 42 illegitimates to 1000. It seems evident that the apparent strong tendency to child-bearing cannot explain the phenomenon.
Equally uncertain is evidence gathered to show that climatic conditions have any large part to play. The following table (for 1896) presents sonic figures hearing upon the geographic distri bution of illegitimacy. The division of cities is roughly made, those in the first column being north of latitude 52° N. and those in the second column south of latitude 49°: due to a variety of causes. There is in the city less social restraint, less danger of detection of paternity, and a greater degree of abandonment on the part of the females. In some instances, however, as in Bavaria and in some other Con tinental countries, the greater freedom of mar riage laws and better industrial opportunities in the city render family life more convenient and irregular relations less common than in country districts, where the conditions of holdings hinder marriages. The high degree of illegitimacy is often an indication of certain laws which affect the situation, as, for example, was the ease in Bavaria. In former times the laws were ex tremely unfavorable to marriage, and a high rate of illegitimacy resulted. The rate of illegiti macy was as follows: 1865-69, 20.59 per cent.; 1871-80, 12.86 per cent.; 1887-91, 14.01 per cent. With the passing of more liberal marriage laws and the use of greater industrial freedom the number of marriages rapidly rose, and a corre sponding fall iv the number of illegitimates took place. The number of marriages increased in the period from 1840-70 from 65 per 10,000 popula tion to 81 per 10,000 population; at the same time the rate of illegitimacy fell from 20.59 per 100 births to 12.86 per 100.