Competent

Answering the requirement of the law; legally able, fit, or qualified: also, proper or admissible as evidence. Whence compet-ency; incompetent, incompetency. A judge is said to be incompetent to hear a cause in which he is interested; and an infant, or a married woman, incompetent to contract for an article not a necessary. All witnesses that have their reason, except such as are infamous, or, at common law, are interested in the event of the cause, are competent, but the jin-y must judge of their credibility,^ q. v. Competency is a question for the court. Every witness is presumed to be competent. Oi'dinarily, incompetency is to be objected to when first known or discovered — before the witness is sworn and his testimony found to be unfavorable.' See further Evidence, Competent; Witness.