to a person beginning to set up house-keeping. Wharton.
BIELBRIEF. Germ. In European maritime law. A document furnished by the builder of a vessel, containing a register of her admeasurement, particularizing the length, breadth, and dimensions of every part of the ship. It sometimes also contains the terms of agreement between the party for whose account the ship is built, and the ship-builder. It has been termed in English the "grand bill of sale;" in French, "contrat de construction ou de la vente d'un vaisseau," and corresponds in a great degree with the English, French, and American "register," (q. v.,) being an equally essential document to the lawful ownership of vessels. Jac. Sea Laws, 12, 13, and note. In the Danish law, it is used to denote the contract of bottomry.
BIENES. Sp. In Spanish law. Goods; property of every description, including real as well as personal property; all things (not being persons) which may serve for the uses of man. Larkin v. U. S., 14 Fed. Cas. 1154.
—Bienes comunes. Common property; those things which, not being the private property of any person, are open to the use of all, such as the air, rain, water, the sea and its beaches. Lux v. Haggin, 69 Cal. 255, 315, 10 Pac. 707.—Bienes gananciales. A species of community in property enjoyed by husband and wife, the property being divisible equally between them on the dissolution of the marriage; does not include what they hold as their separate property at the time of contracting the marriage. Welder v. Lambert, 91 Tex. 510, 44 S. W. 281.—Bienes publicos. Those things which, as to property, pertain to the people or nation, and, as to their use, to the individuals of the territory or district, such as rivers, shores, ports, and public roads. Lux v. Haggin, 69 Cal. 315, 10 Pac. 707.
BIENNIALLY. This term, in a statute, signifies, not duration of time, but a period for the happening of an event; once in every two years. People v. Tremain, 9 Hun. (N. Y.) 576; People v. Kilbourn, 63 N. Y. 479.
BIENS. In English law. Property of every description, except estates of freehold and inheritance. Sugd. Vend. 495; Co. Litt. 119b.
In French law. This term includes all kinds of property, real and personal. Biens are divided into biens meubles, movable property; and biens immeubles, immovable property. The distinction between movable and immovable property is recognized by the continental jurists, and gives rise, in the civil as well as in the common law, to many important distinctions as to rights and remedies. Sully, Confl. Laws, § 13, note 1.
BIGA or BIGATA. A cart or chariot drawn with two horses, coupled side to side; but it is said to be properly a cart with two wheels, sometimes drawn by one horse; and in the ancient records it is used for any cart, wain, or wagon. Jacob.
BIGAMUS. In the civil law. A man who was twice married; one who at different times and successively has married two wives. 4 Inst. 88. One who has two wives living. One who marries a widow.
Bigamus sen trigamus, etc., est qui diversis temporibus et successivè duas seu tres uxores habuit. 4 Inst. 88. A bigamus or trigamus, etc., is one who at different times and successively has married two or three wives.
BIGAMY. The criminal offense of willfully and knowingly contracting a second marriage (or going through the form of a second marriage) while the first marriage, to the knowledge of the offender, is still subsisting and undissolved. Com. v. McNerny, 10 Phila. (Pa.) 207; Gise v. Com., 81 Pa. 430; Scoggins v. State, 32 Ark 213; Cannon v. U. S., 116 U. S. 55, 6 Sup. Ct. 287, 29 L. Ed. 501.
The state of a man who has two wives, or of a woman who has two husbands, living at the same time.
The offense of having a plurality of wives at the same time is commonly denominated "polygamy;" but the name "bigamy" has been more frequently given to it in legal proceedings. 1 Russ. Crimes, 185.
The use of the word "bigamy" to describe this offense is well established by long usage, although often criticised as a corruption of the true meaning of the word. Polygamy is suggested as the correct term, instead of bigamy, to designate the offense of having a plurality of wives or husbands at the same time, and has been adopted for that purpose in the Massachusetts statutes. But as the substance of the offense is marrying a second time, while having a lawful husband or wife living, without regard to the number of marriages that may have taken place, bigamy seems not an inappropriate term. The objection to its use urged by Blackstone (4 Bl. Comm. 163) seems to be founded not so much upon considerations of the etymology of the word as upon the propriety of distinguishing the ecclesiastical offense termed "bigamy" in the canon law, and which is defined below, from the offense known as "bigamy" in the modern criminal law. The same distinction is carefully made by Lord Coke, (4 Inst. 88.) But, the ecclesiastical offense being now obsolete, this reason for substituting polygamy to denote the crime here defined ceases to have weight. Abbott.
In the canon law, the term denoted the offense committed by an ecclesiastic who married two wives successively. It might be committed either by marrying a second wife after the death of a first or by marrying a widow.
BIGOT. An obstinate person, or one that is wedded to an opinion, in matters of religion, etc.
BILAGINES. By-laws of towns; municipal laws.
