LEGITIMACY

Legitimacy

In common law, legitimacy is the status of a child born to parents who are legally married to each other; and of a child conceived before the parents receive a legal divorce. Conversely, illegitimacy is the status of a child born 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.

The above text is a snippet from Wikipedia: Legitimacy (law)
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legitimacy

Noun

  1. the quality of being legitimate or valid; validity


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: legitimacy
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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