Note 1476 — Chapter XVI · A CENTURY AND A QUARTER OF MARRIAGE LEGISLATION IN THE UNITED STATES, 1776-1903 (continued 2)

By the Indiana law such voidable marriages shall be declared void on application of the incapable party, and the children thereof shall be legitimate. The same is true in Kansas, but there cohabitation after incapacity ceases is a sufficient defense to the action for annulment. The law of Minnesota is similar. In Nevada and Nebraska a marriage is "not voidable for want of age, if after attaining the age of consent the parties for any time freely cohabited; nor for want of understanding, if after restoration to reason" they so cohabited. According to the New York statute a marriage is "not voidable on account of want of age at suit of the party who was of age of consent; nor where it appears that the parties after attaining such age freely cohabited; nor of a female under sixteen years of age if she had parental consent to the marriage," or when she ratified it after reaching that age. The law of Oregon is practically the same. In Michigan and Wyoming a marriage of persons below the age of consent is void if they separate during nonage and do not afterward cohabit.