Scripta

A popular expression to designate a supposed rule of law that a man who takes the life of his wife’s paramour or daughter’s seducer is not guilty of a criminal offence. A trial judge is said to have expressed to a jury his approval of a verdict based upon such a theory; see 43 Canada L. J. 764; it is said to have received recognition in California; see 19 Green Bag 721, an article from the London L. ' J.; see also 12 Law Notes 224. The rule was much urged upon a jury in the common pleas of Philadelphia: Biddle, J., said to counsel: “In this court the ‘unwritten law* is not worth the paper It isn't written on.” In Knights of Pythias v. Crenshaw, 129 121 Am. St. Rep. 216, 12 Ann. Cas. 307, on a policy of life insurance which provided that “the death of the insured at the hands of justice, either punitive or preventive,” or “in violation of or attempt to violate any criminal law,” should avoid the policy (in the latter instance pro tanto ), it was held that the killing of the insured by an injured husband was not within the policy.