Herbert,

Before the development of blood type tests and DNA to establish paternity, 
the only proof needed was the say-so of the mother or the child. The only 
defense of the accused father was for him to have his friend stand up in 
court and admit she had slept with them also in the pertinent timeframe.

By all traditional measures of paternity - motive, opportunity, and whatever 
the third indictment is, he is the father of these children based solely on 
the statement of Madison Hemings that his mother told him that Tom was his 
father. The rest of the evidence, that he was a philanderer, that he 
disdained women, that he lied about his pursuit of women, that he 
pronounced, as a teenager, that the use of slave women was preferrable to 
masterbation, are all icing on the cake.

Anne

Anne Pemberton
[log in to unmask]
http://www.erols.com/apembert
http://www.educationalsynthesis.org 

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