LEADER 03669nam 22006732 450 001 9910452468503321 005 20151005020622.0 010 $a1-107-24176-6 010 $a1-139-88973-7 010 $a1-107-25127-3 010 $a1-139-56499-4 010 $a1-107-24795-0 010 $a1-107-25044-7 010 $a1-107-24878-7 010 $a1-107-24961-9 035 $a(CKB)2550000001115125 035 $a(EBL)1357363 035 $a(OCoLC)843079235 035 $a(SSID)ssj0000877387 035 $a(PQKBManifestationID)11465851 035 $a(PQKBTitleCode)TC0000877387 035 $a(PQKBWorkID)10907425 035 $a(PQKB)11315181 035 $a(UkCbUP)CR9781139564991 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC1357363 035 $a(Au-PeEL)EBL1357363 035 $a(CaPaEBR)ebr10753004 035 $a(CaONFJC)MIL515427 035 $a(EXLCZ)992550000001115125 100 $a20120713d2013|||| uy| 0 101 0 $aeng 135 $aur||||||||||| 181 $ctxt$2rdacontent 182 $cc$2rdamedia 183 $acr$2rdacarrier 200 10$aFamily, law, and inheritance in America $ea social and legal history of nineteenth-century Kentucky /$fYvonne Pitts, Purdue University$b[electronic resource] 210 1$aCambridge :$cCambridge University Press,$d2013. 215 $a1 online resource (xiii, 203 pages) $cdigital, PDF file(s) 225 1 $aCambridge historical studies in American law and society 300 $aTitle from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015). 311 $a1-107-03550-3 311 $a1-299-84176-7 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references (p. 185-200) and index. 327 $a1. 'Parental justice': inheritance and obligation in families -- 2. 'My black family': manumissions and freedom in inheritance disputes -- 3. Arbiters of sanity: medical experts and jurists -- 4. Physical impairments and degenerate minds: the body as evidence -- 5. A special power: women's testamentary capacity. 330 $aYvonne Pitts explores inheritance practices by focusing on nineteenth-century testamentary capacity trials in Kentucky in which disinherited family members challenged relatives' wills. These disappointed heirs claimed that their departed relative lacked the capacity required to write a valid will. These inheritance disputes criss-crossed a variety of legal and cultural terrains, including ordinary people's understandings of what constituted insanity and justice, medical experts' attempts to infuse law with science, and the independence claims of women. Pitts uncovers the contradictions in the body of law that explicitly protected free will while simultaneously reinforcing the primacy of blood in mediating claims to inherited property. By anchoring the study in local communities and the texts of elite jurists, Pitts demonstrates that 'capacity' was a term laden with legal meaning and competing communal values about family, race relations and rationality. These concepts evolved as Kentucky transitioned from a conflicted border state with slaves to a developing free-labor, industrializing economy. 410 0$aCambridge historical studies in American law and society. 517 3 $aFamily, Law, & Inheritance in America 606 $aInheritance and succession$zKentucky$y19th century 606 $aWills$zKentucky$y19th century 615 0$aInheritance and succession 615 0$aWills 676 $a346.76905/209034 700 $aPitts$b Yvonne$01052165 801 0$bUkCbUP 801 1$bUkCbUP 906 $aBOOK 912 $a9910452468503321 996 $aFamily, law, and inheritance in America$92483170 997 $aUNINA