2.
Some portion of the blood of the common ancestor flows through the
veins of all his descendants, and though mixed with the blood flowing
from many other families, yet it constitutes the kindred or alliance by
blood between any two of the individuals. This relation by blood is of
two kinds, lineal and collateral.
3.
Lineal consanguinity is that relation which exists among persons, where
one is descended from the other, as between the son and the father, or
the grandfather, and so upwards in a direct ascending line; and between
the father and the son, or the grandson, and so downwards in a direct
descending line. Every generation in this direct course males a degree,
computing either in the ascending or descending line. This being the
natural mode of computing the degrees of lineal, consanguinity, it has
been adopted by the civil, the canon, and the common law.
4.
Collateral consanguinity is the relation subsisting among persons who
descend from the same commnon ancestor, but not from each other. It is
essential to constitute this relation, that they spring from the same
common root or stock, but in different branches. The mode of computing
the degrees is to discover the common ancestor, to begin with him to
reckon downwards, and the degree the two persons, or the more remote of
them, is distant from the ancestor, is the degree of kindred subsisting
between them. For instance, two brothers are related to each other in
the first degree, because from the father to each of them is one degree.
An uncle and a nephew are related to each other in tho second degree,
because the nephew is two degrees distant from the common ancestor, and
the rule of computation is extended to the remotest degrees of
collateral relationship. This is the mode of computation by the common
and canon law. The method of computing by the civil law, is to begin at
either of the persons in questian and count up to the common ancestor,
and then downwards to the, other person, calling it a degree for each
person, both ascending and descending, and the degrees they stand from
each other is the degree in which they stand related. Thus, from a
nephew to his father, is one degree; to the grandfather, two degrees and
then to the uncle, three; which points out the relationship.
5.
The following table, in which the Roman numeral letters express the
degrees by the civil law, and those in Arabic figures at the bottom,
those by the common law, will fully illustrate the subject.
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6.
The mode of the civil law is preferable, for it points out the actual
degree of kindred in all cases; by the mode adopted by the common law,
different relations may stand in the same degree. The uncle and nephew
stand related in the second degree by the common law, and so are two
first cousins, or two sons of two brothers; but by the civil law the
uncle and nephew are in the third degree, and the cousins are in the
fourth. The mode of computation, however, is immaterial, for both will
establish the same person to be the heir. 2 Bl. Com. 202; 1 Swift's Dig.
113; Toull. Civ. Fr. liv. 8, t. 1, o. 3, n. 115. Vide Branch; Degree;
Line.
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