THE LEGAL STATUS OF THE DEAD BODY. THE DISPOSAL AND OBLIGATION TO DISPOSE OF THE SAME; HOW AND BY WHOM IT MAY BE EXHUMED OR REMOVED; AUTOPSIES, BY WHOM ORDERED; THE RIGHTS OF RELATIVES AND ACCUSED PERSONS: INCLUDING AN APPENDIX CONTAINING A SYNOPSIS OF THE STATUTES OF THE DIFFERENT STATES AND TERRITORIES OF THE UNITED STATES CONCERNING SAME. BY TRACY C. BECKER, A.B., LL.B., Counsellor at Law; Professor of Criminal Law and Medical Jurisprudence, Law Department, University of Buffalo, etc. LEGAL STATUS OF THE DEAD BODY. Disposal and Obligations to Dispose of the Same. -There is no right of property, in the ordinary sense of the word, in a dead human body; but for the health and protection of society it is a rule of the common law, which has been confirmed by statutes in all civilized states and countries, that public duties are imposed upon public officers, and private duties upon the husband or wife and the next of kin of the deceased, to protect the body of the dead from violation and see that it is properly interred, and to protect it after interment. A parent is bound to provide Christian burial for a deceased child, if he has the means, but if he has not the means, though the body remains unburied so long as to become a nuisance, he is not indictable for the nuisance, even if he could obtain money for the burial expenses by borrowing it of the poor-law authorities of the parish, for he is not bound to incur a debt (Reg. v. Vann, 2 Div. C. C., 325; 15 Jur., 1,090). On the other hand it has been held in England that every householder in whose house a dead body lies is bound by the common law, if he has the means to do so, to inter the body decently, and this principle applies where a person dies in the house of a parish or a union (Reg. v. Stewart, 12 A. & D., 1,272). And the expense may be paid out of the effects of the deceased (Tugwell v. Hayman, 3 Camp., 298, and note). In Pierce v. The Proprietors Swan Point Cemetery, 10 R. I., 227, s. c., 14 Am. Rep., 667, the Court said: "That there is no right of property in a dead body, using this word in its ordinary sense, may be well admitted, yet the burial of the dead is a subject which interests the feelings of mankind to a much greater degree than many matters of actual property. There is a duty imposed by the universal feelings of mankind to be discharged by some one toward the dead; a duty, and we may also say a right, to protect from violation; it may, therefore, be considered as a sort of quasi property, and it would be discreditable to any |