California Historical Law Guide

Contents

Legal Ages at a Glance

General Principles

Under Spain and Mexico, 1769 to 1850

California was governed by Spain from the first settlements of 1769 and by Mexico from 1821. The law that applied was Spanish civil law as it had been built up for the Americas — the medieval Castilian code called the Siete Partidas, and the Recopilación of 1680 that gathered the law for the Indies — and Mexican independence changed the sovereign rather than the rules¹. Two features of that law matter most to a researcher, and both outlasted it. Marriage was a sacrament of the Catholic Church, so a marriage from these years is recorded in a mission or parish register and in no county book². And what a husband and wife built up together belonged to them equally, which is where California community property comes from; the constitution of 1849 kept that rule when California became a state³.

Land came from the government by concession or grant rather than by purchase from a previous owner. A soldier or settler received a house lot and a field in a pueblo, or a rancher received a rancho from the governor on a petition supported by a sketch map. The papers that grant proceeding generated — the petition, the map, the marginal orders, and the title itself — are the expediente, and they name the grantee and often his family⁴. The secularization of the missions in 1833 broke up the mission estates and put much of that land into private hands.

The ages were not the ones that came in with statehood, and a file from these years has to be read against them. Full age, the youngest ages at which a couple could marry, the consent a marriage needed, and the guardianship of a fatherless child all ran on figures of their own, and each is set out below under the subject it belongs to. A Californio who looks like an adult on an American record may still have been a minor when the document was made.

There were no county courts, no probate courts, and no juries as an American would recognize them. Each town was run by an alcalde, an official who combined the work of mayor, judge, and sheriff in one person. Before anyone could file suit, Mexican law required the dispute to go through conciliación, a compulsory attempt at settlement in front of him⁵. Most civil disputes ended there, which means they left a short record or none.

How the older law carried over

American forces occupied California in 1846, and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed 2 February 1848, transferred the territory to the United States and promised that Mexican citizens who stayed would keep their property⁶. Mexican law stayed in force in the meantime. A conquered territory keeps its own law until the conqueror changes it, and the military governor had a digest of the Mexican statutes printed in English in 1849 so that the courts would know what they were applying⁷. The constitution the voters approved that December said the same thing, continuing every law then in force until the legislature altered or repealed it⁸.

A constitutional convention met in 1849, statehood came on 9 September 1850, and the first legislature adopted the common law of England that same year⁹. Three things carried forward from the older system. Community property continued as the rule for what a husband and wife built up together. A marriage contracted under Mexican law stayed valid after statehood. And land held under a Mexican grant kept its footing, subject to confirmation before the commission of 1851. Each of the three is taken up below, in the section that governs it.

That left California running on two legal traditions at once, and which one applied depended on whose property was in question. For almost everything California was an English common-law state, so the old English rules governed unless a California statute changed them. For the property a husband and wife built up during a marriage, California kept the Spanish and Mexican system. So the answer to a California legal question depends on the subject: common law in general, Spanish-derived community property in marriage.

Each spouse owned two kinds of property, and the difference runs through every California deed, will, and estate file. Separate property was whatever a spouse brought into the marriage, plus anything that came to them during it as a gift or an inheritance. It stayed that spouse's own. Community property was everything else the couple earned or bought during the marriage, and husband and wife each owned half of it¹⁰. The first question to ask of a California estate is not what share the widow inherited. It is whether the property was community or separate, because the two passed by different rules.

Legal Age of Adulthood

Twenty-five under Spain and Mexico

Full age was twenty-five under the Spanish and Mexican law that governed California to 1850, and it was the same for a man and a woman¹¹. Someone of twenty-two or twenty-three in a document of these years was still a minor in law, though the same person would have been an adult a few years later under the American rule.

Twenty-one for a man, eighteen for a woman

For the first four years of statehood the common law California adopted in 1850 supplied the answer, and at common law both a man and a woman came of age at 21¹². From 1854 to 1927 a man reached full age at 21 and a woman at 18. An act with the plain title "An Act fixing the age of majority of males and females in this State" set both figures. A person of full age could make contracts, sell land, and do everything else the law allowed an adult to do¹³. An amendment of 1858 added that a girl under 18 who married with her parent's or guardian's consent was of full age from then on, so between 1858 and 1874 marriage moved a girl into adulthood early¹⁴. The Civil Code carried both ages forward when it took effect in 1873, defining minors as males under 21 and females under 18¹⁵.

From 1927 the age was 21 for both sexes. The legislature rewrote the definition to read that minors are all persons under 21, while leaving the lower ages for marriage in place¹⁶.

The date on a file tells you which rule was running. A guardianship over a girl that closed when she turned 18 belongs before 1927; one that ran to 21 belongs after. For a boy it ran to 21 the whole time.

Other ages that stood on their own

Several California ages sat near majority but were fixed by separate rules, and each has to be checked on its own terms. The age to make a will was 18, for either sex and for every kind of property, from the first year of statehood. The age to choose one's own guardian was 14. The age to sell land or sign a deed was 18 from July 1874, and before that it followed full age — 21 for a man and 18 for a woman. A person could own land at any age either way, but could not make a binding agreement about it until he or she reached the age the rule then set¹⁷. The ages for marriage ran on their own track and are set out below.

Marriage

Who was old enough to marry

Under Spain and Mexico a boy could marry at fourteen and a girl at twelve, the same two ages the English common law used¹⁸, and statehood did not change them. Before the Civil Code took effect in 1873 those ages still governed. The marriage act of 1850 regulated the ceremony and the consent of parents but left them where they stood¹⁹. The Civil Code raised them, setting the lowest marrying age at 18 for a man and 15 for a woman²⁰. An amendment of 1921 rebuilt the whole framework. A man of 21 and a woman of 18 could marry on their own. A man of 18 to 20, or a woman of 16 to 17, could marry if a parent or guardian filed written consent with the county clerk²¹.

Parental consent

Under Spain and Mexico marriage took a father's consent up to twenty-five for a man and twenty-three for a woman. If the father was dead the mother consented, and a man could then marry on his own at twenty-four and a woman at twenty-two²². Statehood replaced those figures with the two ages of full majority.

Two different ages were at work, and they are easy to confuse. One was the youngest age at which a person could marry at all. The other was the age at which a person could marry without asking anyone. A license needed a parent's consent whenever the groom was under 21 or the bride under 18 — the two ages of full majority — and those two ages did not change from 1850 through 1950²³. So a groom of 19 in 1880 was old enough to marry but still needed his father's written consent, while a bride of 19 that same year was already an adult and needed no one's permission. Nothing in her license file will name a consenting parent.

The duty to collect that consent fell on the county clerk who issued the license, and the marriage itself stood whether or not the clerk did the job. Where a clerk handed a license to someone under age without the parent's consent and the wedding went ahead, the marriage was valid and could not be undone on that ground²⁴. An irregular license is a sign of a careless clerk, not of an invalid marriage.

Marriage without a license, to May 1895

Until late May 1895 a California couple could marry with no license, no minister, and no paperwork at all. They needed only to agree to be married and then live together openly as husband and wife. This was a common-law marriage, and it was as valid as any other. An amendment approved on 26 March 1895 added the requirement that the couple's agreement be followed by a ceremony, so from then on a California marriage took a license and a service performed by someone the law authorized. The amendment took effect sixty days after it passed, which puts the changeover in late May 1895 rather than on 1 January²⁵.

That change cuts two ways for a researcher, and both are useful. Before that date a couple with no license may still have been fully married, and their children were legitimate, so the absence of a record proves nothing. From late May 1895 the license and the certificate the person who performed the ceremony returned to the county are the documents to look for, and their absence means something. From 1905 the county sent a duplicate of each marriage record to the state, which is where the statewide index begins²⁶. A marriage that was valid where it was performed was valid in California, so a couple barred here could cross a state line and come back married²⁷.

One provision kept a group of marriages out of the county books entirely. A couple already living together, neither of them a minor, could be married by any clergyman without a license, and the certificate went onto that church's own register and nowhere else²⁸. Where a couple who clearly married cannot be found in the county index, look for a church register.

Marriages the law would not allow

A marriage between close relatives was void from the start — treated as though it had never happened. The bar covered parents and children and their ancestors and descendants at every remove, brothers and sisters whether they shared one parent or two, and uncles with nieces or aunts with nephews²⁹. A second marriage was also void where an earlier husband or wife was still living and the first marriage still in force. One narrow exception applied: the earlier spouse had been absent, and not known to be living, for five straight years³⁰.

Race and marriage

Race was written into California marriage law in the state's first year, and each racial bar applied on the terms its own statute set for as long as that statute lasted. From 1850 a marriage between a white person and a Black or mixed-race person was void³¹. The bar on marriage with a person of Chinese, Japanese, or other East Asian descent arrived in two steps, and the statutes used the term "Mongolian" throughout. First came a rule forbidding the county clerk to issue the license³², and then, in 1901, a rule making the marriage itself void³³. The legislature extended the bar to Filipinos in 1933³⁴, after a court had held that a Filipino did not fall within the earlier wording³⁵. The California Supreme Court struck down the whole racial bar on 1 October 1948, the first state high court in the country to do so³⁶. Because a barred couple could marry in a state that allowed it, the record of a mixed marriage from these years often sits outside California.

These lines shaped where different families' marriage records ended up. Black and mixed-race couples who were not barred married under the ordinary law, appear in the county and church records like anyone else, and their children were legitimate. A person held in bondage had no legal marriage at all; California recognized no lawful slavery, but slaveholders brought enslaved people west and a state fugitive-slave law of 1852 helped them hold on to them³⁷. A marriage by Native custom stood outside the county system and had no clear footing in California law, so the documents that name Native families in these years are the mission registers and the indenture and enrollment papers described under Property Ownership below.

Marriages contracted under Mexican law stayed valid after statehood, on the same rule that recognized any marriage good where it was made. A Californio couple's marriage is therefore recorded in the mission and parish registers of the Catholic Church rather than in any county book²⁷.

Property Ownership

Which men could own land

Land ownership rested on the common law California adopted in 1850, and under it a free man owned land outright. Title could come to a male of any age by purchase, gift, inheritance, or devise — a gift of land made by will — and what he held was his to keep, sell, or leave to whomever he chose. The one age limit touched dealing in land rather than holding it. From July 1874 he could not sign a deed that would stand, or make a binding bargain about land, until he was 18; before that date the line was full age, which for a man was 21¹⁷.

A foreign-born man's right rested on residence rather than citizenship. The 1849 constitution promised every foreigner who was or became a genuine resident the same rights to hold, enjoy, and inherit property as a native-born citizen, so a newly arrived immigrant stood on the same footing as anyone else³⁸. The 1879 constitution narrowed that promise to resident foreigners of the white race or of African descent who were eligible to become citizens under federal law³⁹. Since federal law let only white and African-descended immigrants naturalize, this set immigrants from China, Japan, and the rest of Asia apart, and it opened the way to the alien land laws described below.

Women and land ownership

A single woman or a widow was a feme sole — a woman free of the legal limits that marriage placed on a wife — and she bought, sold, sued, and was sued on exactly the same terms as a man⁴⁰. A married woman kept her own separate property, but two rules governed how she dealt with it, and each of them left a document behind.

From its first year California required a public register of a married woman's separate property. A full inventory of what she owned had to be written out, signed, and recorded with the county recorder, and recording it protected those goods from being seized for her husband's debts⁴¹. Counties kept these in a register of their own, listing land, livestock, furniture, and household goods item by item under the woman's name. For a woman who otherwise appears only as a name on a census line, it can be the fullest surviving record of her life.

From 1852 a married woman could run a business in her own name as a sole trader. She filed a sworn affidavit with the county recorder, and from then on she kept what she earned and it stood beyond the reach of her husband's creditors⁴², often entered in the same register as the separate-property inventories. The affidavit names the woman, names her husband, and describes the business, and nineteenth-century examples show women ranching, farming, and keeping hotels and boarding houses.

Which children could own land

A child owned land from birth. Title could reach a child by inheritance, gift, will, or grant at any age. Selling it was the difficulty. From July 1874 a person under 18 could not make a binding agreement about land, and a deed signed by anyone younger had no effect; before that date the age was full age, 21 for a boy and 18 for a girl¹⁷.

A child's land was therefore sold through the probate court — the court that handles the property of the dead and of children — on the guardian's petition and under a court order, with the money held for the child under bond⁴³. A single sale of a child's land leaves a petition, a hearing, an order, a bond, and a deed signed by the guardian instead of the owner. Where a California deed conveys a child's land, the guardianship file will name the family.

When a wife signed her husband's deed

Because California ended dower and curtesy in 1850 — the lifetime interest each spouse had, at English law, in the other's land — a husband sold his own land on his own signature, and a wife's name appears on a California deed only in the situations the community-property rules created. The husband managed the community property, and for much of the period he could sell or mortgage the couple's real estate over his signature alone. Two acts changed that, and each draws a line a researcher can use⁴⁴.

So a wife's name on a California deed points to one of three things: the land was hers separately, the transfer was a gift of community property after 1891, or the deed falls after 1917. The 1917 line is the sharp one. Before it, a missing wife's signature on a deed of community land is the ordinary form and means nothing; after it, her signature is expected and its absence is worth a second look.

Deed formalities, the private examination, and witnesses

A California deed was a written paper signed by the grantor — the person giving up the land — then acknowledged before a notary or other authorized officer, and recorded with the county where the land lay. Acknowledging a deed means appearing before that officer and stating that the signature is genuine and freely given; the officer then signs a certificate saying so. Recording it is what made the deed good against anyone who bought the same land later⁴⁵.

Into the early 1890s a married woman's deed carried one extra step. The officer had to examine her privately, apart from her husband and out of his hearing, and satisfy himself that she signed of her own free will and understood what she was signing. This private examination was written onto the certificate⁴⁶. Later acts let a married woman acknowledge a deed on the same terms as anyone else, and the private examination disappeared from the certificates⁴⁷. A certificate that records one therefore dates the deed to the earlier era.

A California deed was complete on the grantor's signature and the officer's certificate. Where witnesses did sign as well, a witness of any age could serve, provided the person understood what they had seen and could tell it truly⁴⁸.

Enslaved people, free people of color, Native people, and immigrants

California came into the Union as a free state, its first constitution forbidding slavery outright, and in principle Black, Chinese, and Native residents could own and inherit land⁴⁹. Several laws narrowed that in practice, and each either created a record or prevented one.

Slaveholders brought enslaved people west although California recognized no lawful slavery, and the state fugitive-slave law of 1852 helped them hold those people; it was the law at the center of the Archy Lee case³⁷. A person held in bondage owned nothing in law. Free Black Californians owned, held, and left land by will on the same terms as anyone else, and they appear in the land records accordingly.

For Native Californians the great record is the Mexican land grant. A federal act of 1851 required every holder of a Mexican grant to prove the title before a commission, and the slow and costly hearings cost many families their ranchos⁵⁰. The case files those hearings produced are among the richest genealogical records in the state. A second body of records came out of the Act for the Government and Protection of Indians of 1850. Under it a white person could take custody of a Native child before a justice of the peace, holding a boy to 18 and a girl to 15⁵¹. An amendment of 1860 lengthened the terms and reached adults as well⁵², the custody provision was repealed in 1863, and the act was repealed in full in 1937⁵³. Those papers, filed before justices of the peace and county judges, are often the only documents that name a Native Californian child in the 1850s and 1860s.

Asian immigrants faced a different kind of bar. Federal law forbade immigrants from China, Japan, Korea, and India to become citizens, and California used that federal rule as a lever. An act of 1913 provided that a person who could not become a citizen could not own farmland or lease it for more than three years⁵⁴. A measure the voters approved on 2 November 1920 went further, stopping immigrant parents from putting land in the names of their American-born children and from being appointed those children's guardians⁵⁵.

Japanese immigrant parents nevertheless placed farmland in the names of children born in the United States, or formed corporations to hold it. A deed handing a valuable ranch to a young child, and a guardianship opened over the same child, are often two halves of one arrangement and should be read together. The 1920 measure also required a yearly report, filed with the Secretary of State and the county clerk, from anyone holding such land in trust for an alien or a minor, naming the holder, the property, and how it came into their hands⁵⁵.

In 1942 the forced removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast produced a wave of hurried sales that show in the deeds. The legislature amended the 1920 measure in 1923 and again in 1943, and after the war the state brought escheat proceedings — suits to have land forfeited to the state — to take land it said had been held in violation of the law. Those suits are court files that name the family and describe the land. The law was held unconstitutional as applied to a citizen child in 1948 and struck down in full in 1952⁵⁶.

Inheritance

A person who died without a will died intestate, and a statute divided what they left. Before any share can be worked out, the estate has to be sorted into community property and separate property, because each passed by its own rules. Separate property was what a spouse brought into the marriage, or received during it by gift or inheritance; community property was everything else the couple earned or bought while married, and each spouse owned half of it¹⁰.

Community property at death

The rules differed for a husband and a wife, and they changed in 1923. On a husband's death before 1923, half the community property was already the widow's own. The other half was his to leave by will. If he left no will, that half went to his children, and where he left no descendants either it was divided like his separate property, which brought the widow back in⁵⁷. On a wife's death, the whole of the community property stayed with the surviving husband without any court proceeding, because her half was not hers to give away⁵⁸. That last rule has a large consequence for research: when a married woman died in nineteenth-century California there was often no probate file at all, because there was nothing for a court to administer.

From 1923 the surviving spouse took the dead spouse's half of the community property when there was no will, so the survivor ended up with all of it⁵⁹. In 1927 the legislature declared that husband and wife held present, existing, and equal interests in the community property during the marriage⁶⁰.

Separate property at death

A spouse's separate property passed to the surviving spouse and the children in fixed fractions, and among the children the division was always equal, each taking the same portion whatever their sex or birth order⁶¹:

• With one child, the surviving spouse took half and the child took half.
• With more than one child, the surviving spouse took a third and the children shared the other two-thirds.
• With no children, half went to the surviving spouse and half to the parents of the person who died, or to that person's brothers and sisters if the parents were gone.
• With no children, parents, or brothers and sisters, the surviving spouse took everything.

Reading the two piles together explains an estate that looks lopsided at first. A file in which the widow took only a third is usually a separate-property estate, with her community half sitting outside the probate altogether. A file in which she appears to take everything is usually community property. A file in which she took half while the children took the other half is very likely a husband's community property before 1923.

The widow's protections

A California widow was provided for out of property she already owned. The state took this approach from its first year: an act of 1850 ended dower and curtesy for California⁶². Dower was the widow's right, under English law, to the use of part of her late husband's land for the rest of her life; curtesy was the widower's matching right in his late wife's land. Neither gave ownership, only use for a lifetime. In their place a California widow took her own half of the community property, the family home, and an allowance paid while the estate was settled, so an estate file records those three things rather than a portion of land measured out for her lifetime.

Three arrangements protected the family home and gave the widow support, and each leaves its own paper. A recorded declaration of homestead protected the family's residence from being sold to pay debts; where the home came out of community property it passed straight to the survivor when either spouse died, often with no probate at all⁶³. The declaration names the person filing it, usually names the spouse, and describes the land. While an estate was being settled, the probate court could set aside a home and order an allowance paid to the widow and the minor children⁶⁴. And a small estate could close almost as soon as it opened: where an intestate estate came to no more than $1,500 the court handed the whole of it to the widow and minor children and stopped the administration there⁶⁵. A very thin file, or one that simply stops, is often this rule at work rather than a lost record.

Minors, guardians, and the age of fourteen

Under Spain and Mexico a child who lost a father came under a tutor, the Spanish guardian. The appointment was required for a boy under fourteen and a girl under twelve; below those ages the tutor made the child's contracts, above them the child acted with the tutor's consent, and a minor who asked for a tutor could stay under him to twenty-five⁶⁶.

After statehood a child's inheritance went to a guardian, who answered to the probate court and posted a bond. Guardianship came in two forms that appear separately in the records: guardianship of the person, meaning the care of the child, and guardianship of the estate, meaning the care of the property⁶⁷. The probate and county courts handled these in the early decades, and the Superior Court did so after the 1879 constitution reorganized the courts⁴⁹.

Two ages date a person here. A minor of 14 or over could name his or her own guardian, subject to the court's approval, while for a child under 14 the court chose one⁶⁸. A file in which the child does the naming therefore shows a child of at least 14. Guardianship then ran until the ward came of age: 21 for a boy throughout, and for a girl 18 before 1927 and 21 after. When the ward came of age and took the property, a receipt or discharge was filed, and that single document can fix a birth year within a few months.

A guardian was appointed most often because a child owned property, not because a parent had died. A guardianship opened over a child whose father was alive and well usually means property reached the child from somewhere other than the father — a grandparent, an uncle, or the mother's family — and the guardian is often someone outside the household. A parent could also name a guardian in a will.

Children born outside marriage

A child born outside marriage could inherit in California, and each of the four routes leaves a different trace.

From the mother, always. Such a child was in every case an heir of the mother and inherited from her as though born within a marriage, with no acknowledgment and no court proceeding needed⁶⁹.

From a father who acknowledged the child in writing. The same section made the child an heir of a man who signed a paper in front of a witness stating that he was the father⁷⁰. That signed and witnessed paper is a document to hunt for — in the probate file, among the county recorder's miscellaneous records, or with the exhibits in a will contest.

By the later marriage of the parents. A child born before its parents married became legitimate when they married⁷¹. Where an inheritance runs to a child whose birth came first, the marriage is the record to find.

By a father taking the child into his home. A father who publicly acknowledged the child as his, received the child into his family — with his wife's consent, if he was married — and treated the child as legitimate made that child legitimate from birth, with no court order required⁷². Because this route rested on how a man behaved rather than on anything he signed, the argument about whether it happened often surfaces years afterward in a fight over an estate, tried on the testimony of neighbors⁷³. Where a man denied being the father, the question was settled in a support case brought against him, and that file names him.

Wills, executors, and witnesses

The age to make a will was 18, for either sex and for land and goods alike, from the first year of statehood. The wills act of 1850 allowed every person over 18 and of sound mind to dispose of their whole estate by will, and the Civil Code carried that wording forward almost unchanged⁷⁴. A will made by anyone younger had no effect.

A married woman's will carried an extra requirement in the early decades. Under the 1850 act her will was good only with her husband's written consent, witnessed and attached to the will, unless a marriage contract or his written authority given before the wedding had already granted her the power. An amendment of 1874 let her leave her separate property by will on her own⁷⁵. Where a married woman's will from before 1874 survives, look for the husband's consent attached to it — a signed and witnessed document naming him. Her half of the community property did not come under her own will until 1923⁵⁹.

A valid California will was written, signed by the testator — the person making it — and signed by two witnesses, each of whom signed while the testator watched⁷⁶. California also accepted what the code called an olographic will, meaning one written, dated, and signed entirely in the testator's own hand, and that kind needed no witnesses at all⁷⁷. It accepted a nuncupative will as well — a spoken one — but only within tight limits. The goods could be worth no more than $500. The words had to be spoken during the last illness, in front of two witnesses, and written down soon after. Soldiers on service and sailors at sea had more latitude⁷⁸.

A witness to a will could be of any age, so long as the person was competent to testify — meaning old enough and clear-headed enough to understand the oath and tell what happened, and a gift to a witness had a rule of its own. Where a will left something to one of its own witnesses, that gift failed unless two other competent witnesses had also signed; the witness stayed competent to prove the will either way⁷⁹. A legacy to a witness that fails is still worth noting, because it tells you the person who drew the will thought that witness close enough to the family to be remembered in it.

An executor — the person named in a will to carry it out, called an executrix when the person was a woman — had to be of full age and had to post a bond⁸⁰. A person the court appointed instead, where there was no will or no one able to serve, was an administrator, or an administratrix if a woman. Read together with the ages of majority, that means a man serving as executor was at least 21 throughout, and a woman at least 18 before 1927 and 21 after. Before 1891 a married woman could not be appointed to settle an intestate estate, though a will could name her executrix; a widow could serve, since she was no longer married, but marrying again ended her authority. From 1891 a married woman could be appointed, and marrying no longer ended an appointment already held⁸¹. Where a will named someone who could not serve, the court gave the job to another person, so read the letters the court issued rather than the will to learn who actually settled the estate.

Taxation

What was taxed

Five taxes fell on individuals in California: a tax on property, a poll tax, a road tax, and two aimed at particular groups, the Foreign Miners' License Tax and the Chinese Police Tax. The property tax was assessed county by county each year. The assessor listed every taxable inhabitant and every piece of taxable property, and the assessment book that resulted names the owner and describes the land, which places a family in one spot in one year⁸².

A sixth tax fell on the estate rather than on the person. California charged an inheritance tax from 1893, at first only on what passed to more distant relatives and then, from 1905, on what passed to close ones as well⁸³. The valuation made for it in a probate file lists the people who inherited and how each was related to the person who died.

The poll tax and who counted as a poll

California charged a poll tax, meaning a fixed sum demanded from a person simply for being a person rather than for owning anything. Lawyers called it a capitation tax, from the Latin for head, and the "poll" is the taxable head being counted. Poll taxes ran through the California revenue acts from the 1850s, and the Political Code then set the tax at $2 a year on every male inhabitant over 21 and under 60, with the money going to the state school fund⁸⁴. The 1879 constitution then required it. Every male inhabitant of the state over 21 and under 60 owed at least two dollars a year, and the money went to the school fund. The constitution excepted paupers, Native people who were not taxed, and people it described in the language of the day as idiots or insane⁸⁵.

The poll tax came and went, which matters when a list is missing. The voters ended it in 1914, rewriting the same section of the constitution that had required it so that no poll or head tax of any kind could be levied in California⁸⁶. Later amendments reached only aliens, and a tax levied on aliens in 1921 was struck down by the state Supreme Court. In 1924 the voters directed the legislature to levy an educational poll tax instead⁸⁷, and repealed the section outright in 1946⁸⁸.

For anyone hunting a list, the catch is that the 1924 provision only told the legislature to act, and the legislature never did. The argument for repeal printed in the 1946 voter pamphlet says the legislature refrained from levying the tax, and that the provision sat in the constitution looking like a standing instruction to impose it. California poll-tax lists therefore end in 1914 and do not resume. A man named on one belongs to the years before that, apart from the brief tax on aliens in 1921. A separate road poll tax of up to three dollars fell each year on every male between 21 and 55 found in a road district, with men honorably discharged from Union service in the Civil War excepted⁸⁹. The road-district lists are another place a man of working age is named.

The taxes aimed at particular groups

The Foreign Miners' License Tax fell on miners who were not citizens. The first act, in 1850, charged twenty dollars a month and was repealed the following year after the collections collapsed⁹⁰. A second act of 1852 charged a smaller monthly sum that rose over the years, and after 1852 it fell overwhelmingly on Chinese miners until its repeal in 1870⁹¹. The tax collector's receipts and records are what it left behind.

The Chinese Police Tax, laid by an act approved 26 April 1862, charged two dollars and fifty cents a month on people the statute described as of the Mongolian race who were 18 and over. The California Supreme Court struck it down the same year, holding that it intruded on the federal government's authority over trade with other nations⁹².

Courts

Jury service

A California juror had to meet five tests⁹³:

• He was a citizen of the United States, aged 21 or over.
• He had lived in the state a year and in the county ninety days.
• He was in possession of his natural faculties and of ordinary intelligence.
• He could understand English.
• He was assessed on the county's last assessment roll for property belonging to him.

That last requirement is the useful one: it applied to every juror, not merely to the talesman — the bystander called in at the courthouse to fill out a jury when too few of the summoned men appeared. A man who sat on a California jury owned taxable property, and the assessment roll for that year should name him.

Women and Black men on juries

Jury service followed the vote, because the jurors act said so. From 1852 a juror had to be a citizen of the United States and an elector of the county he was returned in. He had to be over 21 and under 60, in possession of his natural faculties, and free of any conviction for a felony or for a misdemeanor involving moral turpitude⁹⁴. Since the 1849 constitution gave the vote to white male citizens, the elector requirement drew early juries from white men only. The Fifteenth Amendment, ratified in February 1870, barred the states from denying the vote on account of race, so from that year a Black man met the elector requirement and qualified for a California jury on the same footing as any other man. From 1873 the Code of Civil Procedure dropped the elector test altogether and asked instead for citizenship, residence, and a property assessment⁹⁵. Women became eligible on 28 July 1917, six years after California women won the vote, when the legislature amended the jury law to admit them⁹⁶.

The age of criminal responsibility

Before the Penal Code took effect in 1873, the common law California had adopted in 1850 governed⁹: Three age bands applied:

• Under 7, a child could not commit a crime at all.
• From 7 to 14, a child was presumed unable to, and the State had to prove otherwise.
• At 14, a child carried full responsibility.

The Penal Code set a single rule for every child under 14. Such a child could be convicted only on clear proof that the child knew the act was wrong at the time, and that presumption could be overcome by evidence, so the trial turned on what the child understood. A child of 14 or over carried full responsibility⁹⁷.

From the early twentieth century a child accused of an offense went before a separate court. An act of 1903 set up a juvenile court and treated a child under sixteen who broke the law as a delinquent rather than as a defendant, and an act of 1909 raised that age to eighteen⁹⁸. From those years the record of a child's case sits in the juvenile court files rather than the criminal ones, and it is usually closed to the public.

Witnesses

Competence decided who could testify, whether in a criminal case, a civil case, on a deed, or on a will. A witness who understood the duty of the oath, took in what happened, and could relate it truly was allowed to testify, and a child of any age who met that test could take the stand. A child under 10 who appeared unable to take in the facts or to relate them truly was excluded⁴⁸.

Two rules reached particular witnesses. Neither husband nor wife could be examined for or against the other without that spouse's consent. Neither could be made to repeat what the other had said in confidence during the marriage⁹⁹; apart from that, a woman was a competent witness throughout the period.

Race barred certain testimony in the early decades. From 1850 a Black, mixed-race, or Native person could not give evidence for or against a white person, in criminal cases and, under the Civil Practice Act, in civil ones as well¹⁰⁰. The courts extended the bar to Chinese witnesses in 1854¹⁰¹. The bar on Black testimony was repealed in 1863, and the remaining racial bars ended with the codes that took effect on 1 January 1873. While they lasted, a case against a white party could go forward only on the evidence of competent white witnesses. That is why a California lawsuit from the 1850s can be full of depositions and yet silent from the Black, Native, or Chinese people who actually saw what happened. From 1863 for Black witnesses, and from 1873 for everyone, a competent person could testify whatever their race.

Sources & Where to Verify

Constitutions

• California Constitution of 1849. Art. I, § 17 (property rights of foreigners); art. II, § 1 (electors); art. XI, § 14 (separate property of a married woman); art. XI, § 15 (homestead); Schedule following art. XII, § 1 (existing laws continued). Full text and digital images of the English version, with images of the Spanish version, in the Records of the Constitutional Convention of 1849. Digital images, California State Archives, Sacramento (https://www.sos.ca.gov/archives/collections/constitutions : accessed 23 July 2026).
• California Constitution of 1879. Art. I, § 17 (property rights of foreigners); art. XIII, § 12 (poll tax). Read in the version published in the Statutes of California of 1880. Digital images, California State Archives, Sacramento (https://www.sos.ca.gov/archives/collections/constitutions : accessed 23 July 2026).

Codes and Compilations

• The Civil Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, Amended at Subsequent Sessions, and Adapted to the Constitution of 1879; and an Appendix of General Laws upon the Subjects Embraced in the Code. Compiled by James H. Deering. San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1897. The most-used volume for this guide. Each section carries a bracketed note of its amendments, so read that note before treating the printed wording as the wording of 1872. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/1872civilcodecal00cali : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Code of Civil Procedure of the State of California, Adopted March 11, 1872, and Amended up to and including 1906. Edited by James H. Deering. Statutory history and citation digest by Walter S. Brann. Consolidated and edited 1 June 1906 by R. M. Sims. San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1906. Holds jurors (§§ 198–199), the qualifications of executors and administrators (§§ 1350–1354, 1370), the probate homestead, family allowance, and small estates (§§ 1464–1470), guardianship (§§ 1747–1752), sole traders (§§ 1811–1821), and witness competency (§§ 1879–1881). Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/codeofcivilproce00calirich : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Code of Civil Procedure of the State of California, Adopted March 11th, 1872, and Amended in 1885. San Francisco: S. Whitney & Company, 1885. Use this edition for the rules as they stood before the amendments of 1891. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/codecivilproced12courgoog : accessed 23 July 2026).
• Halleck, H. W., and W. E. P. Hartnell. Translation and Digest of Such Portions of the Mexican Laws of March 20th and May 23d, 1837, as Are Supposed to Be Still in Force and Adapted to the Present Condition of California. Monterey, 1849. Printed by order of the military governor so that the courts would know what law they were applying between the conquest and statehood; the starting point for the Mexican period. Digital images, Google Books (https://books.google.com/books?id=WLsLAQAAIAAJ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Schmidt, Gustavus. The Civil Law of Spain and Mexico, Arranged on the Principles of the Modern Codes, with Notes and References. New Orleans: Thomas Rea, 1851. An English digest of the Spanish and Mexican civil law, published the year after California became a state and used by California lawyers who had to argue about pre-1850 transactions. Holds capacity to marry (art. 29), consent to marry (arts. 8–9), the age of majority (art. 128), and tutorship of minors (arts. 108–130). Digital images, HathiTrust Digital Library (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.35112104554862&seq=13 : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Hittell, Theodore H., and Charles H. Parker, comps. The General Laws of the State of California, from 1850 to 1864, Inclusive. San Francisco: H. H. Bancroft, 1865. 2 vols. A second, corrected edition followed in 1870. The working compilation of the statutes passed before the codes, arranged by subject, and the fastest way to read the 1850s acts on wills, descents, marriage, sole traders, and taxation. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/generallawsstat01hittgoog : accessed 23 July 2026).
• Johnston, A. J., superintendent of state printing. Index to the Laws of California, 1850–1893: Including the Statutes, the State Edition of the Codes, 1872, and Subsequent Amendments, and the Constitution of 1879. Prepared under the supervision of the California Commission for Revision and Reform of the Law. Sacramento: State Printing Office, 1894. Indexes the early acts by page and traces each one to the code section that replaced it, which is the quickest way to place an act passed before 1872. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/indextolawscali00caligoog : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Penal Code of the State of California, Adopted February 14, 1872, with Amendments up to and including Those of the Forty-first Session of the Legislature, 1915. Edited by James H. Deering. Legislative history by Charles H. Fairall. San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1915. Holds the age of criminal responsibility (§ 26). Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/penalcodeofstate00cali : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Political Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, and Amended up to and including 1897. By James H. Deering. San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Co., 1897. Holds the poll tax (§§ 3839, 3861) and the road poll tax (§ 2652). Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/politicalcodeofs00cali : accessed 23 July 2026).

Session Laws

The session volumes are digitized by the Office of the Chief Clerk at https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/historical-information/archive-list?field_archive_type_value=Statutes (accessed 23 July 2026), and several of the nineteenth-century volumes are on the Internet Archive. The official title changes across the run: the volumes to 1881 are The Statutes of California, those of 1883 through 1919 are The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, and those from 1920 are Statutes of California. In the sessions that amended the codes, the amendments were bound as their own volume, listed here under its own title.

• The Statutes of California, Passed at the First Session of the Legislature, 1850. San José: J. Winchester, State Printer, 1850. The volume behind more of this guide than any other: ch. 95, adopting the common law; ch. 97, the first Foreign Miners' License Tax; ch. 99, § 14, the bar on testimony; ch. 103, husband and wife, and the end of dower and curtesy at § 10; ch. 133, p. 408, the Indians act; ch. 140, p. 424, marriage; ch. 142, § 394, the Civil Practice Act; p. 177, wills; p. 219, descents and distributions. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1850/1850.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California, Passed at the Third Session of the Legislature, 1852. San Francisco: G. K. Fitch & Co. and V. E. Geiger & Co., State Printers, 1852. Ch. 37, the second Foreign Miners' License Tax; ch. 42, sole traders; ch. 47, jurors. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1852/1852.PDF : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California, Passed at the Fifth Session of the Legislature, 1854. Sacramento: B. B. Redding, State Printer, 1854. Ch. 39, p. 44, the age of majority. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1854/1854.PDF : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Statutes of California, Ninth Session of the Legislature, 1858. Sacramento: John O'Meara, State Printer, 1858. P. 108, a married female under eighteen deemed of full age. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1858/1858.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California, Passed at the Eleventh Session of the Legislature, 1860. Sacramento: Charles T. Botts, State Printer, 1860. Ch. 231, the Indians act amended; the enrolled text is transcribed in Johnston-Dodds, app. 2. Digital images, HathiTrust Digital Library (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=osu.32437123173193 : accessed 4 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California, Passed at the Thirteenth Session of the Legislature, 1862. Sacramento: Benj. P. Avery, State Printer, 1862. P. 669, descents amended; ch. 339, p. 462, the Chinese police tax. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/statutescalifor20greggoog : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Statutes of California, Passed at the Fourteenth Session of the Legislature, 1863. Sacramento: Benj. P. Avery, State Printer, 1863. Ch. 475, repealing section 3 of the Indians act; ch. 499, amending the same act. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/statutescalifor13greggoog : accessed 23 July 2026).
• Amendments to the Codes of California, Passed at the Twentieth Session of the Legislature, 1873–4. Sacramento: G. H. Springer, State Printer, 1874. P. 182, Civil Code §§ 28 and 33; p. 185, §§ 56 and 58; p. 195, §§ 215 and 223; p. 232, § 1273; p. 236, §§ 1384–1385. The session that reshaped the ages in this guide. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1873/1873_74Code.PDF : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Amendments to the Codes of California, Passed at the Twenty-Second Session of the Legislature, 1877–8. Sacramento: State Printer, 1878. P. 75, Civil Code § 79, marriage by a clergyman without a license. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1877/1877_78code.PDF : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Amendments to the Codes of California, Passed at the Twenty-Third Session of the Legislature, 1880. Sacramento: State Printer, 1880. P. 3, Civil Code § 69, the marriage-license bar; p. 17, Political Code § 3839, the poll tax. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1880/1880Code.PDF : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Passed at the Twenty-Ninth Session of the Legislature, 1891. Sacramento: State Office, A. J. Johnston, Supt. State Printing, 1891. P. 11, married women as administratrices; p. 137, acknowledgments; p. 425, gifts of community property. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/statutescalifor07greggoog : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Passed at the Thirtieth Session of the Legislature, 1893. Sacramento: State Office, A. J. Johnston, Supt. State Printing, 1893. Ch. 168, the first inheritance tax, effective 23 March 1893. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1893/1893.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Thirty-First Session of the Legislature, 1895. Sacramento: State Office, A. J. Johnston, Supt. State Printing, 1895. P. 47 and p. 88, the end of marriage without a ceremony. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1895/1895.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Thirty-Fourth Session of the Legislature, 1901. Sacramento: A. J. Johnston, Superintendent State Printing, 1901. P. 335, the racial marriage bar extended in Civil Code § 60. Scanned with the 1900 extra session as the 1900–01 volume. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1900/1901.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Passed at the Thirty-Fifth Session of the Legislature, 1903. Sacramento: W. W. Shannon, Superintendent State Printing, 1903. Ch. 43, p. 44, the first juvenile court act. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1903/1903.PDF : accessed 23 July 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Passed at the Thirty-Sixth Session of the Legislature, 1905. Sacramento: W. W. Shannon, Superintendent State Printing, 1905. The marriage registry act approved 18 March 1905, which begins the statewide index; ch. 314, the Inheritance Tax Act of 1905. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1905/1905.PDF : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Passed at the Thirty-Eighth Session of the Legislature, 1909. Sacramento: W. W. Shannon, Superintendent State Printing, 1909. Ch. 133, p. 213, the Juvenile Court Law. Scanned with the 1907 session as the 1907–09 volume. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1907_09/1909.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Passed at the Fortieth Session of the Legislature, 1913. Sacramento: Friend Wm. Richardson, Superintendent of State Printing, 1913. Ch. 113, the alien land law. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1913/1913.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Statutes of California and Amendments to the Codes, Passed at the Forty-Third Session of the Legislature, 1917. Sacramento: California State Printing Office, 1917. Ch. 583, § 2, p. 829, a wife's signature on community real estate; ch. 694, p. 1288, women admitted to jury service. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1917/17Vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Statutes of California, Passed at the Regular Session of the Forty-Fourth Legislature, 1921. Sacramento: California State Printing Office, 1921. Ch. 233, p. 333, the marriage ages in Civil Code § 56. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1921/21Vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Statutes of California, Passed at the Regular Session of the Forty-Fifth Legislature, 1923. Sacramento: California State Printing Office, Frank J. Smith, Superintendent, 1923. Ch. 18, the surviving spouse's share of the community property, and a married woman's power to will her half. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1923/23Vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Statutes of California, Passed at the Regular Session of the Forty-Seventh Legislature, 1927. Sacramento: California State Printing Office, 1927. Ch. 265, § 1, p. 484, equal community interests; ch. 661, p. 1119, majority at twenty-one for both sexes. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1927/27vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Statutes of California, Passed at the Regular Session of the Fiftieth Legislature, 1933. Sacramento: California State Printing Office, Harry Hammond, State Printer, 1933. P. 561, the racial marriage bar extended. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1933/33Vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Statutes of California, Passed at the Regular Session of the Fifty-Second Legislature, 1937. Sacramento: California State Printing Office, George H. Moore, State Printer, 1937. Ch. 369, p. 1005, the Indians act repealed in full; the Statutory Record in the appendix, under Statutes Other Than Codes, 1850. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1937/37vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).

Court Cases

• Encinas v. Lowthian Freight Lines. 69 Cal. App. 2d 156 (1945). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2609481/encinas-v-lowthian-freight-lines-inc/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Estate of Lund. 26 Cal. 2d 472 (1945). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1168894/estate-of-lund/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Guardianship of Ambrose. 170 Cal. 160 (1915). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3304667/matter-of-guardianship-of-ambrose/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Hakes Investment Co. v. Lyons. 166 Cal. 557 (1913). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3305499/hakes-investment-co-v-lyons/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• In re Archy. 9 Cal. 147 (1858). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/5591302/in-re-archy/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Johnson v. Alexander. 39 Cal. App. 177 (1918). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3293930/johnson-v-alexander/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Lin Sing v. Washburn. 20 Cal. 534 (1862). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/5592631/lin-sing-v-washburn/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Oyama v. California. 332 U.S. 633 (1948). Digital images, Justia (https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/332/633/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• People ex rel. Attorney-General v. Naglee. 1 Cal. 232 (1850). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/5590079/people-ex-rel-attorney-general-v-naglee/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• People v. Hall. 4 Cal. 399 (1854). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/5590541/people-v-hall/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Perez v. Sharp. 32 Cal. 2d 711 (1948). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1361202/perez-v-sharp/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Roldan v. Los Angeles County. 129 Cal. App. 267 (1933). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3292597/roldan-v-los-angeles-county/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Sei Fujii v. State. 38 Cal. 2d 718 (1952). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1182633/sei-fujii-v-state-of-california/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Vaughn v. Vaughn. 62 Cal. App. 2d 260 (1944). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1131248/vaughn-v-vaughn/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Von Schmidt v. Huntington. 1 Cal. 55 (1850). Digital images, CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/5590029/von-schmidt-v-huntington/ : accessed 6 August 2026).

Secondary and Reference Works

• “California Land and Property.” FamilySearch Research Wiki. On the commission on Mexican land grants and the case files it produced. (https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/California_Land_and_Property : accessed 23 July 2026).
• “Sacramento County, California Genealogy.” FamilySearch Research Wiki. Lists the county recorder's Separate Property of Married Women, and Sole Traders, 1851–1930 — the two filings kept as one register — with its custodian and dates. (https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Sacramento_County,_California_Genealogy : accessed 23 July 2026).
• California State Archives. Sacramento. Holds county records transferred to the state, including custody papers made under the 1850 Indians act, and the constitutions. (https://www.sos.ca.gov/archives : accessed 23 July 2026).
• California State Lands Commission. Grants of Land in California Made by Spanish or Mexican Authorities. Sacramento, 1982. Explains the concessions, pueblo lots, and ranchos of the Spanish and Mexican period and the officials who granted them. (https://www.slc.ca.gov/land-types/grants-of-land-in-california-made-by-spanish-or-mexican-authorities/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• The Early California Population Project: A Database Compiled and Developed at the Huntington Library. Hosted by the University of California, Riverside. Abstracts every surviving baptism, marriage, and burial entered in the California mission registers between 1769 and 1850, together with the Los Angeles Plaza Church and the Santa Barbara presidio. The place to look for a marriage, a baptism, or a burial from before the county books begin. (https://ecpp.ucr.edu/ : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Goode, Barry, and John S. Caragozian. “California Without Law: 1846 Through 1850.” California Legal History 18 (2023): 167–85. On the alcalde, on conciliación, and on how Mexican law survived the conquest. Digital images, California Supreme Court Historical Society (https://www.cschs.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Legal-Hist.-v.18-Articles-California-Without-Law.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Johnston-Dodds, Kimberly. Early California Laws and Policies Related to California Indians. CRB 02-014. Sacramento: California Research Bureau, California State Library, 2002. Prints the enrolled text of the 1850 Indians act and the 1860 amendment. (https://tribalaffairs.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/2002-Early-California-Laws-and-Policies-Related-to-California-I.pdf : accessed 23 July 2026).
• National Archives and Records Administration. Records of the War Relocation Authority, Record Group 210. The case files name every member of a family removed from the West Coast in 1942, with birth dates and birthplaces. (https://www.archives.gov/research/japanese-americans : accessed 6 August 2026).
• Online Archive of California. “California Private Land Claims Collection, 1852–1884.” A published inventory of the case files generated by the commission on Mexican land grants. (https://oac.cdlib.org : accessed 23 July 2026).
• Russell, Judy G. “Reprise: California's Sole Traders.” The Legal Genealogist. Cites a San Mateo County sole-trader affidavit of 1856 from the same combined register, showing the form the filing takes and the county recorder as its custodian. (https://www.legalgenealogist.com/2014/10/30/reprise-californias-sole-traders/ : accessed 23 July 2026).
• U.S. Women's Bureau. The Legal Status of Women in the United States of America: January 1, 1948, Report for California. Bulletin 157-4, revised. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1950. A digest of California law on majority, married women's property, wills, intestacy, guardianship, marriage, and jury service, with citations to the code then in force. Use it as a cross-check and confirm each citation against the statute itself. Digital images, FRASER, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/5430 : accessed 23 July 2026).

Citations

1. The land law of Spanish and Mexican California descended from the medieval Castilian code known as the Siete Partidas and from the Recopilación de las Leyes de los Reynos de las Indias of 1680, and the Mexican colonization law of 1824 and its regulation of 1828 set the terms on which the governors made grants. California State Lands Commission, Grants of Land in California Made by Spanish or Mexican Authorities (Sacramento, 1982) (https://www.slc.ca.gov/land-types/grants-of-land-in-california-made-by-spanish-or-mexican-authorities/ : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
2. The Franciscan missionaries kept baptism, marriage, and burial registers at each mission, and those registers are the vital records of the period. The Early California Population Project has abstracted the whole surviving run — about 104,000 baptisms, 28,000 marriages, and 72,000 burials performed in California between 1769 and 1850, from the twenty-one missions together with the Los Angeles Plaza Church and the Santa Barbara presidio. The Early California Population Project: A Database Compiled and Developed at the Huntington Library, hosted by the University of California, Riverside (https://ecpp.ucr.edu/ : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
3. California Constitution of 1849, art. XI, § 14; "An Act defining the rights and duties of Husband and Wife," Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 103, approved 17 April 1850 ↩
4. California State Lands Commission, Grants of Land in California Made by Spanish or Mexican Authorities (Sacramento, 1982), on the concessions, pueblo lots, and ranchos and on the officials who granted them (https://www.slc.ca.gov/land-types/grants-of-land-in-california-made-by-spanish-or-mexican-authorities/ : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
5. Von Schmidt v. Huntington, 1 Cal. 55 (1850), holding that conciliación was required under the Mexican statute and then refusing to enforce it; Barry Goode and John S. Caragozian, “California Without Law: 1846 Through 1850,” California Legal History 18 (2023): 167–85, at 169 and 174–83, on the alcalde's combined powers and on the survival of Mexican law after the conquest. Digital images, California Supreme Court Historical Society (https://www.cschs.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Legal-Hist.-v.18-Articles-California-Without-Law.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
6. Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed 2 February 1848, 9 Stat. 922, arts. VIII–IX, under which the property of Mexicans remaining in the ceded territory was to be inviolably respected ↩
7. H. W. Halleck and W. E. P. Hartnell, Translation and Digest of Such Portions of the Mexican Laws of March 20th and May 23d, 1837, as Are Supposed to Be Still in Force and Adapted to the Present Condition of California (Monterey, 1849), the volume the military governor had printed so that the courts would know what law they were applying; digital images, Google Books (https://books.google.com/books?id=WLsLAQAAIAAJ : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
8. California Constitution of 1849, Schedule (following art. XII), § 1, continuing in force all laws in force at the adoption of the constitution and not inconsistent with it, until altered or repealed by the legislature. Digital images, California State Archives, Sacramento (https://www.sos.ca.gov/archives/collections/constitutions : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
9. "An Act adopting the Common Law," The Statutes of California, Passed at the First Session of the Legislature (San José: J. Winchester, State Printer, 1850), ch. 95, approved 13 April 1850; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/archive-list?archive_type=statutes : accessed 23 July 2026). The rule is carried today at Civil Code § 22.2 ↩ ↩
10. Civil Code §§ 162–164. Section 162 makes a wife's property owned before marriage, and what came to her afterward by gift, bequest, devise, or descent, her separate property; § 163 says the same for a husband; and § 164 provides that “all other property acquired after marriage by either husband or wife, or both, is community property.” Read here in The Civil Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, Amended at Subsequent Sessions, and Adapted to the Constitution of 1879, comp. James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1897); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/1872civilcodecal00cali : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩ ↩
11. Gustavus Schmidt, The Civil Law of Spain and Mexico, Arranged on the Principles of the Modern Codes, with Notes and References (New Orleans: Thomas Rea, 1851), art. 128, p. 27, which heads the list of persons under legal disability with “minors under the age of twenty-five years”; digital images, HathiTrust Digital Library (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.35112104554862&seq=159 : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
12. The 1854 act governed from 1854. For the four years before it, the common law California adopted in 1850 supplied the rule, and at common law both sexes came of age at 21. See “An Act adopting the Common Law,” Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 95 ↩
13. "An Act fixing the age of Majority of Males and Females in this State," Statutes of California, 1854, ch. 39, p. 44, passed 10 May 1854: "Males shall be deemed of full and legal age when they shall be twenty-one years old, and females when they shall be eighteen years old," and persons of legal age are "competent to make contracts, convey real estate, and do all other acts and things that persons of full age may legally do"; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1854/1854.PDF : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
14. Statutes of California, 1858, p. 108. The rule went into the Civil Code at § 28, “Status of minors, how changed,” and was repealed 30 March 1874, effective 1 July 1874 (Amendments to the Codes, 1873–4, p. 182). The rule therefore ran from 1858 to 30 June 1874 and no later. Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1858/1858.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
15. Civil Code § 25: "Minors are: 1. Males under twenty-one years of age; 2. Females under eighteen years of age" ↩
16. Statutes of California, 1927, ch. 661, p. 1119, amending Civil Code § 25 to define minors as all persons under twenty-one; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1927/27vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
17. Civil Code § 33, as amended 30 March 1874, Amendments to the Codes, 1873–4, p. 182, in effect 1 July 1874: a minor "cannot give a delegation of power, nor under the age of eighteen, make a contract relating to real property, or any interest therein"; applied in Hakes Investment Co. v. Lyons, 166 Cal. 557 (1913). Before that date the age followed full age under the act of 1854, males at 21 and females at 18: Statutes of California, 1854, ch. 39, p. 44 ↩ ↩ ↩
18. Gustavus Schmidt, The Civil Law of Spain and Mexico, Arranged on the Principles of the Modern Codes, with Notes and References (New Orleans: Thomas Rea, 1851), art. 29, p. 8, listing among the persons incapable of contracting marriage “males under fourteen years of age, and females under the age of twelve”; digital images, HathiTrust Digital Library (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.35112104554862&seq=140 : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
19. "An Act regulating Marriages," Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 140, p. 424, § 7 ↩
20. Civil Code § 56: "Any unmarried male of the age of eighteen years or upwards, and any unmarried female of the age of fifteen years or upwards, and not otherwise disqualified, are capable of consenting to and consummating marriage" ↩
21. An act to amend section fifty-six of the Civil Code, relating to the capability of minors to contract marriage, Statutes of California, 1921, ch. 233, p. 333, approved 23 May 1921, in effect 29 July 1921: any unmarried male of 21 or upwards and any unmarried female of 18 or upwards, not otherwise disqualified, is capable of consenting to and consummating marriage; a male under 21 and over 18, or a female under 18 and over 16, is capable with the written consent of a parent or guardian filed by the clerk issuing the license under Civil Code § 69; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1921/21Vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
22. Gustavus Schmidt, The Civil Law of Spain and Mexico, Arranged on the Principles of the Modern Codes, with Notes and References (New Orleans: Thomas Rea, 1851), arts. 8–9, p. 4: males under twenty-five and females under twenty-three had to obtain the previous consent of the father, if living; where the father was dead the mother's consent was needed, but a man could then marry without it at twenty-four and a woman at twenty-two. Digital images, HathiTrust Digital Library (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.35112104554862&seq=136 : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
23. Civil Code § 69, requiring the license to show the parties' ages and, "if the male be under the age of twenty-one, or the female under the age of eighteen years, the consent of the father, mother, or guardian," the written consent to be filed by the clerk ↩
24. Civil Code § 68, as amended 26 March 1895, Statutes of California, 1895, p. 88: marriage must be licensed, solemnized, authenticated, and recorded as the article provides, "but noncompliance with its provisions by other than the parties to a marriage does not invalidate that marriage"; see also Guardianship of Ambrose, 170 Cal. 160 (1915); Johnson v. Alexander, 39 Cal. App. 177 (1918); Vaughn v. Vaughn, 62 Cal. App. 2d 260 (1944) ↩
25. Civil Code § 55, as amended 26 March 1895, Statutes of California, 1895, p. 88, the code noting the amendment "in effect in sixty days" — that is, on or about 25 May 1895 ↩
26. An act approved 18 March 1905 required the person who performed a marriage to file a certificate of registry with the county recorder within three days, and the state has filed and indexed county copies since 1 July 1905. Statutes of California, 1905; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1905/1905.PDF : accessed 6 August 2026). For the July 1905 starting date of the statewide index, see California Secretary of State, “Frequently Asked Questions,” California State Archives (https://www.sos.ca.gov/archives/faq : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
27. Civil Code § 63: “All marriages contracted without this State, which would be valid by the laws of the country in which the same were contracted, are valid in this State.” Read here in The Civil Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, Amended at Subsequent Sessions, and Adapted to the Constitution of 1879, comp. James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1897); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/1872civilcodecal00cali : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩ ↩
28. Civil Code § 79, new section approved 6 February 1878, Amendments to the Codes, 1877–8, p. 75, in effect immediately: unmarried persons, not minors, who have been living together as man and wife "may, without a license, be married by any clergyman," the certificate to be recorded on that church's records, and "no other record need be made" ↩
29. Civil Code § 59: marriages between parents and children, ancestors and descendants of every degree, brothers and sisters of the half as well as the whole blood, and uncles with nieces or aunts with nephews "are incestuous, and void from the beginning" ↩
30. Civil Code § 61, the exception running to a former spouse "absent, and not known to such person to be living for the space of five successive years" ↩
31. Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 140, p. 424 ↩
32. Civil Code § 69, as amended 6 April 1880, Amendments to the Codes, 1880, p. 3, in effect immediately, forbidding the clerk to "issue a license authorizing the marriage of a white person with a negro, mulatto, or Mongolian" ↩
33. Civil Code § 60, which in the 1897 edition still read "All marriages of white persons with negroes or mulattoes are illegal and void"; amended to reach Mongolians by Statutes of California, 1901, p. 335, as recited in Perez v. Sharp, 32 Cal. 2d 711 (1948) ↩
34. Statutes of California, 1933, p. 561, recited in Perez v. Sharp, 32 Cal. 2d 711 ↩
35. Roldan v. Los Angeles County, 129 Cal. App. 267 (1933) ↩
36. Perez v. Sharp, 32 Cal. 2d 711 (1948), decided 1 October 1948 ↩
37. In re Archy, 9 Cal. 147 (1858) ↩ ↩
38. California Constitution of 1849, art. I, § 17 ↩
39. California Constitution of 1879, art. I, § 17 ↩
40. The disabilities California placed on a married woman's contracts and conveyances ran to wives only, so an unmarried woman or a widow contracted, conveyed, sued, and was sued as any adult did: Civil Code §§ 158, 167, and 1186, read against § 27, “All other persons are adults.” Read here in The Civil Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, Amended at Subsequent Sessions, and Adapted to the Constitution of 1879, comp. James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1897); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/1872civilcodecal00cali : accessed 23 July 2026). For a digest of the position as it stood at the end of the period, see U.S. Women's Bureau, The Legal Status of Women in the United States of America: January 1, 1948, Report for California, Bulletin 157-4, rev. (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1950); digital images, FRASER, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/5430 : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
41. California Constitution of 1849, art. XI, § 14; Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 103, §§ 3–5 ↩
42. "An Act to authorize married women to transact business in their own name as Sole Traders," The Statutes of California, Passed at the Third Session of the Legislature (San Francisco: G. K. Fitch & Co. and V. E. Geiger & Co., State Printers, 1852), ch. 42, approved 12 April 1852; carried into the codes as Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1811–1821, read here in The Code of Civil Procedure of the State of California, Adopted March 11, 1872, and Amended up to and including 1906, ed. James H. Deering, statutory history by Walter S. Brann, consolidated and edited 1 June 1906 by R. M. Sims (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1906); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/codeofcivilproce00calirich : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
43. A guardian's sale of his ward's land ran on a fixed course: a petition, notice to the next of kin, a hearing at which the guardian could be examined on oath, an order of sale, a further bond given before selling, and a return and confirmation, all following the rules for the estates of deceased persons. Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1781–1791, and by § 1789 the whole proceeding conforms to the provisions on decedents' estates. Read here in The Code of Civil Procedure of the State of California, Adopted March 11, 1872, and Amended up to and including 1906, ed. James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1906); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/codeofcivilproce00calirich : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
44. Civil Code § 172, as amended 31 March 1891, Statutes of California, 1891, p. 425: the husband has management and control of the community property, "provided, however, that he cannot make a gift of such community property, or convey the same without a valuable consideration, unless the wife, in writing, consent thereto"; the wife's signature was required on any sale, mortgage, or long lease by Statutes of California, 1917, ch. 583, § 2, p. 829, adding Civil Code § 172a ↩
45. Civil Code §§ 1091, 1161, 1213–1215 ↩
46. Civil Code § 1186: a married woman's acknowledgment "must not be taken, unless she is made acquainted by the officer with the contents of the instrument on an examination without the hearing of her husband" ↩
47. Civil Code § 1187, as amended 19 March 1891, Statutes of California, 1891, p. 137, in effect immediately: "A conveyance by a married woman has the same effect as if she were unmarried, and may be acknowledged in the same manner" ↩
48. Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1879–1880; by § 1880 those who cannot be witnesses include "children under ten years of age, who appear incapable of receiving just impressions of the facts respecting which they are examined, or of relating them truly" ↩ ↩
49. California Constitution of 1849, art. I, § 18: “Neither slavery, nor involuntary servitude, unless for the punishment of crimes, shall ever be tolerated in this State.” Digital images, California State Archives, Sacramento (https://www.sos.ca.gov/archives/collections/constitutions : accessed 23 July 2026). The Superior Court took over guardianship and probate business under the California Constitution of 1879, art. VI, § 5 ↩ ↩
50. Act of 3 March 1851, ch. 41, 9 Stat. 631, “An Act to ascertain and settle the private Land Claims in the State of California”; digital images, U.S. Government Publishing Office (https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/STATUTE-9/STATUTE-9-Pg631-2 : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
51. "An Act for the Government and Protection of Indians," Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 133, p. 408, approved 22 April 1850 ↩
52. Statutes of California, 1860, ch. 231, approved 18 April 1860, printed in full in Kimberly Johnston-Dodds, Early California Laws and Policies Related to California Indians, CRB 02-014 (Sacramento: California Research Bureau, California State Library, 2002), app. 2; digital images, California Governor's Office of Tribal Affairs (https://tribalaffairs.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/2002-Early-California-Laws-and-Policies-Related-to-California-I.pdf : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
53. Section 3, the custody provision, was repealed by Statutes of California, 1863, ch. 475; ch. 499 of the same session amended the act further. The act was repealed in full by Statutes of California, 1937, ch. 369, p. 1005, as the Statutory Record printed in the appendix to the 1937 volume confirms. Digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/statutescalifor13greggoog : accessed 23 July 2026) and California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1937/37vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
54. Statutes of California, 1913, ch. 113, approved 19 May 1913 ↩
55. An Act Relating to the Rights, Powers and Disabilities of Aliens and of Certain Companies, Associations and Corporations With Respect to Property in This State, Providing for Escheats in Certain Cases, Prescribing the Procedure Therein, Requiring Reports of Certain Property Holdings to Facilitate the Enforcement of This Act, Prescribing Penalties for Violation of the Provisions Hereof, and Repealing All Acts or Parts of Acts Inconsistent or in Conflict Herewith (the Alien Land Law), initiative measure adopted at the general election of 2 November 1920 — a date recited in the text of Senate Constitutional Amendment 17, Proposition 15 on the ballot of 1946, which describes the act as approved by the electorate on that day — sec. 4 (an alien ineligible to citizenship may not be appointed guardian of the part of a minor's estate made up of property the alien may not hold, and the public administrator may be named guardian of a citizen child whose parents are ineligible), sec. 5 (every trustee holding such property for an alien or a minor must file a verified report each year, by 31 January, with the Secretary of State and the county clerk), and sec. 9 (a transfer colorable in form is void where made to evade the act, with a presumption of evasion where land is taken in another's name but paid for by an ineligible alien); digital images, UC Law SF Scholarship Repository, California Ballot Propositions and Initiatives, Initiative 1920-a-2 (https://repository.uclawsf.edu/ca_ballot_inits/35 : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩ ↩
56. The amendments of 20 June 1923 and 8 June 1943, and the escheat proceedings brought under the act, are recited in Senate Constitutional Amendment 17, Proposition 15 on the ballot of 1946, a measure to confirm those amendments; the argument against it, by the Japanese American Citizens League, describes escheat suits then pending against Japanese American farm properties. Digital images, UC Law SF Scholarship Repository, California Ballot Propositions and Initiatives, Proposition 16 (1946) (https://repository.uclawsf.edu/ca_ballot_props/468 : accessed 23 July 2026). See Oyama v. California, 332 U.S. 633 (1948); Sei Fujii v. State, 38 Cal. 2d 718 (1952) ↩
57. Civil Code § 1402 ↩
58. Civil Code § 1401 ↩
59. Statutes of California, 1923, ch. 18, amending Civil Code §§ 1401–1402 ↩ ↩
60. Civil Code § 161a, added by Statutes of California, 1927, ch. 265, § 1, p. 484 ↩
61. "An Act to regulate Descents and Distributions," Statutes of California, 1850, p. 219; carried into the codes as Civil Code § 1386 ↩
62. Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 103, § 10; the rule stands in the codes as Civil Code § 173, "No estate is allowed the husband as tenant by courtesy upon the death of his wife, nor is any estate in dower allotted to the wife upon the death of her husband," read here in The Civil Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, Amended at Subsequent Sessions, and Adapted to the Constitution of 1879, comp. James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1897); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/1872civilcodecal00cali : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
63. Civil Code §§ 1237–1269; by § 1265, where the homestead was selected by a married person from the community property it "vests in the survivor" on the death of either spouse; California Constitution of 1849, art. XI, § 15 ↩
64. Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1464–1470 ↩
65. Code of Civil Procedure § 1469, applying where "the value of the whole estate does not exceed the sum of fifteen hundred dollars," the title then vesting absolutely in the widow or minor children ↩
66. Gustavus Schmidt, The Civil Law of Spain and Mexico, Arranged on the Principles of the Modern Codes, with Notes and References (New Orleans: Thomas Rea, 1851), arts. 108–109, p. 26, and art. 130, p. 32: every male orphan under fourteen and every female orphan under twelve had to have a tutor; above those ages a minor was not generally required to have one, but a minor who asked for a tutor stayed under him until twenty-five; and below fourteen and twelve the tutor made the minor's civil contracts, while above those ages the minor contracted with the tutor's consent. Digital images, HathiTrust Digital Library (https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.35112104554862&seq=158 and https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.35112104554862&seq=164 : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
67. Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1747, 1753–1754. By § 1747 the court could appoint guardians “for the persons and estates, or either of them, of minors,” and could act on the petition of the minor himself if he was fourteen; by § 1753 the guardian had the custody and care of the minor's education and the management of his estate until the minor came of age, married, or the guardian was discharged; and by § 1754 no letters issued until the guardian gave a bond with sureties, conditioned first on making an inventory of the ward's whole estate. Read here in The Code of Civil Procedure of the State of California, Adopted March 11, 1872, and Amended up to and including 1906, ed. James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1906); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/codeofcivilproce00calirich : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
68. Code of Civil Procedure § 1748: "If the minor is under the age of fourteen years, the court may nominate and appoint his guardian. If he is fourteen years of age, he may nominate his own guardian, who, if approved by the court, must be appointed accordingly" ↩
69. Civil Code § 1387: every child born outside marriage "in all cases is an heir of his mother," inheriting as if born in lawful wedlock ↩
70. Civil Code § 1387, making such a child an heir of "the person who, in writing, signed in the presence of a competent witness, acknowledges himself to be the father" ↩
71. Civil Code § 215, new section approved 30 March 1874, Amendments to the Codes, 1873–4, p. 195, in effect 1 July 1874: "A child born before wedlock becomes legitimate by the subsequent marriage of its parents"; applied in Encinas v. Lowthian Freight Lines, 69 Cal. App. 2d 156 (1945) ↩
72. Civil Code § 230: the father, "by publicly acknowledging it as his own, receiving it as such, with the consent of his wife, if he is married, into his family, and otherwise treating it as if it were a legitimate child," makes the child "for all purposes legitimate from the time of its birth" ↩
73. Estate of Lund, 26 Cal. 2d 472 (1945) ↩
74. "An Act concerning Wills," Statutes of California, 1850, p. 177, § 1, as cited in the code; carried into Civil Code § 1270, "Every person over the age of eighteen years, of sound mind, may, by last will, dispose of all his estate, real and personal" ↩
75. Civil Code § 1273, as amended 30 March 1874, Amendments to the Codes, 1873–4, p. 232, in effect 1 July 1874: "A married woman may dispose of all her separate estate by will, without the consent of her husband" ↩
76. Civil Code § 1276, requiring the will to be subscribed at the end by the testator, the subscription made in the presence of the attesting witnesses or acknowledged to them, and the testator to declare to them that the instrument is his will ↩
77. Civil Code § 1277: "An olographic will is one that is entirely written, dated, and signed by the hand of the testator himself. It is subject to no other form … and need not be witnessed" ↩
78. "An Act concerning Wills," Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 72, §§ 7–9; carried into the codes as Civil Code §§ 1288–1296 ↩
79. Civil Code § 1282: beneficial devises, legacies, and gifts to a subscribing witness "are void, unless there are two other competent subscribing witnesses to the same" ↩
80. Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1350, 1354, incompetency of executors and administrators, a minor being incompetent to serve ↩
81. Code of Civil Procedure §§ 1352, 1370. The 1885 edition of the code carries the earlier rule at § 1352 — an unmarried woman executrix or administratrix who marries loses her authority; a married woman named in a will may be executrix, but not administratrix — and § 1370 was amended in 1891 (Statutes of California, 1891, p. 11) to provide that a married woman may be appointed administratrix and that an unmarried administratrix who marries does not thereby lose her authority ↩
82. Political Code § 3628 required the assessor, between the first Mondays in March and July each year, to ascertain the names of all taxable inhabitants and all property in the county subject to taxation and to assess it to the person who owned, claimed, possessed, or controlled it; § 3650 set out the assessment book, which lists the name of the person assessed and describes the land by township, range, and section. Read here in The Political Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, and Amended up to and including 1897, by James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Co., 1897); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/politicalcodeofs00cali : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
83. The first California inheritance tax fell only on collateral relatives and exempted estates under $500: Statutes of California, 1893, ch. 168, effective 23 March 1893; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1893/1893.pdf : accessed 6 August 2026). The Inheritance Tax Act of 1905 replaced it and reached direct relatives as well: Statutes of California, 1905, ch. 314; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1905/1905.PDF : accessed 6 August 2026) ↩
84. Political Code § 3839, as amended 22 March 1880, Amendments to the Codes, 1880, p. 17: "Every male inhabitant of this State, over twenty-one and under sixty years of age, except paupers, insane persons, and Indians not taxed, must annually pay a poll tax of two dollars," rising to three dollars if paid after the first Monday in July; by § 3861 the proceeds went to the county treasurer "for the exclusive use of the State School Fund." Read here in The Political Code of the State of California, as Enacted in 1872, and Amended up to and including 1897, by James H. Deering (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Co., 1897); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/politicalcodeofs00cali : accessed 23 July 2026). Poll taxes ran through the California revenue acts from the 1850s, which are gathered by subject in Theodore H. Hittell and Charles H. Parker, comps., The General Laws of the State of California, from 1850 to 1864, Inclusive (San Francisco: H. H. Bancroft, 1865), under Revenue and under Roads; digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/generallawsstat01hittgoog : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
85. California Constitution of 1879, art. XIII, § 12 ↩
86. “Abolition of Poll Tax,” initiative amendment to article XIII, section 12, of the Constitution, rewriting that section to read “No poll tax or head tax for any purpose whatsoever shall be levied or collected in the State of California.” The petition was filed with the Secretary of State on 21 September 1912 and certified on 6 January 1914, and the measure carried at the general election of November 1914. digital images, UC Law SF Scholarship Repository, California Ballot Propositions and Initiatives, Initiative 1914-a-1 (https://repository.uclawsf.edu/ca_ballot_inits/7 : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
87. “Poll Taxes,” Assembly Constitutional Amendment 47, Proposition 13 on the ballot of 1924, amending the same section to direct that the legislature “shall provide for the levy and collection of an annual educational poll tax of not less than five dollars on every male inhabitant of this state over twenty-one and under fifty years of age,” excepting men holding an honorable discharge, those already paying five dollars or more a year in property tax, and paupers and persons declared insane. The measure prints the provision it replaced, which had required a tax of not less than four dollars on every alien male inhabitant between twenty-one and sixty. digital images, UC Law SF Scholarship Repository, California Ballot Propositions and Initiatives, Proposition 13 (1924) (https://repository.uclawsf.edu/ca_ballot_props/194 : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
88. “Repeal of Educational Poll Tax,” Assembly Constitutional Amendment 28, Proposition 16 on the ballot of 1946, repealing article XIII, section 12, outright. The argument for repeal printed in the voter pamphlet states that the legislature never levied the tax the 1924 amendment called for, and that a four-dollar tax levied on aliens in 1921 was held unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court. digital images, UC Law SF Scholarship Repository, California Ballot Propositions and Initiatives, Proposition 16 (1946) (https://repository.uclawsf.edu/ca_ballot_props/468 : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
89. Political Code § 2652, levying on "each male person over twenty-one and under fifty-five years of age found in each road district" an annual road poll tax not exceeding three dollars, excepting men honorably discharged from the army or navy of the United States between 1 April 1861 and 1 September 1865 ↩
90. Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 97; the act was before the court in People ex rel. Attorney-General v. Naglee, 1 Cal. 232 (1850) ↩
91. Statutes of California, 1852, ch. 37 ↩
92. "An Act to protect Free White Labor against competition with Chinese Coolie Labor, and to discourage the Immigration of the Chinese into the State of California," Statutes of California, 1862, ch. 339, p. 462, approved 26 April 1862, laying on every person of the "Mongolian race" of eighteen or over "a monthly capitation tax of two dollars and fifty cents," called in section 4 the "Chinese police tax"; struck down in Lin Sing v. Washburn, 20 Cal. 534 (1862); digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1862/1862.PDF : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
93. Code of Civil Procedure § 198, enacted 11 March 1872 and amended in 1875–6, p. 89, and 1880, p. 45: a person is competent to act as juror if he be a citizen of the United States of the age of twenty-one years, resident of the state one year and of the county ninety days, "in possession of his natural faculties, and of ordinary intelligence, and not decrepit," possessed of sufficient knowledge of English, and "assessed on the last assessment roll of the county … on property belonging to him"; disqualifications at § 199 ↩
94. "An Act Concerning Jurors," Statutes of California, 1852, ch. 47, art. I, § 1, "The qualifications and exemptions of jurors"; California Constitution of 1849, art. II, § 1, confining the vote, and so the elector requirement, to white male citizens. The 1852 qualifications ran until the Code of Civil Procedure took effect in 1873 ↩
95. U.S. Constitution, amend. XV, ratified 3 February 1870, which barred the states from denying the vote on account of race and so removed the color bar from the elector requirement in the jurors act of 1852. From 1873 the Code of Civil Procedure dropped the elector requirement and asked instead for citizenship, residence, and a property assessment: Code of Civil Procedure § 198 ↩
96. Statutes of California, 1917, ch. 694, p. 1288, amending Code of Civil Procedure § 198 to admit women to jury service, effective 28 July 1917; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1917/17Vol1_Chapters.pdf : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
97. Penal Code § 26, excepting from criminal capacity "children under the age of fourteen, in the absence of clear proof that at the time of committing the act charged against them, they knew its wrongfulness." Read here in The Penal Code of the State of California, Adopted February 14, 1872, with Amendments up to and including Those of the Forty-first Session of the Legislature, 1915, ed. James H. Deering, legislative history by Charles H. Fairall (San Francisco: Bancroft-Whitney Company, 1915); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/penalcodeofstate00cali : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
98. “An act defining and providing for the control, protection, and treatment of dependent and delinquent children,” Statutes of California, 1903, ch. 43, p. 44, approved 26 February 1903, section 1 applying the act to “children under the age of sixteen years”; digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1903/1903.PDF : accessed 23 July 2026). It was replaced by “An act concerning dependent and delinquent minor children,” Statutes of California, 1909, ch. 133, p. 213, approved 8 March 1909, whose section 1 provides that the act “shall be known as the ‘Juvenile Court Law’ and shall apply only to children under the age of eighteen years.” Digital images, California State Assembly, Office of the Chief Clerk (https://clerk.assembly.ca.gov/sites/clerk.assembly.ca.gov/files/archive/Statutes/1907_09/1909.pdf : accessed 23 July 2026) ↩
99. Code of Civil Procedure § 1881: "A husband cannot be examined for or against his wife without her consent; nor a wife for or against her husband without his consent" ↩
100. Act of 16 April 1850, Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 99, § 14; Civil Practice Act, Statutes of California, 1850, ch. 142, § 394 ↩
101. People v. Hall, 4 Cal. 399 (1854) ↩

Note: This law guide was created with assistance from multiple AI tools. Though a diligent effort was made to ensure the accuracy of the information provided, there may be unintentional errors. It's important to check the primary sources as needed to ensure accuracy.