or acquire any rights during war, unless by treaty between the belligerent powers the right is given. He may be sued on existing contracts, and unless a contract existing at the time of the war is of such a character that it is continuing in its nature, war will not destroy it. Where persons engaged in certain callings are required to have a license to carry on their avocations, the statutes of some states make their contracts void, unless they have such license.

§ 196. Infants.-An infant is a person under twenty-one years of age, and while under that age he can make no binding contract except in the following cases, viz. (1) For necessaries. (2) Contracts entered into by authority of law, as in the case of a recognizance in his own behalf. (3) Contracts created by law, as where an infant marries he is bound to support his wife. According to the weight of authority he is not bound by a contract under which he has received something of value which he can not return. His other contracts are voidable; that is, the infant may ratify, perform or repudiate them at his option. An infant where his father has emancipated him, by relinquishing his custody and refusing to maintain him, may receive his own earnings, but it does not enlarge his capacity to make contracts.

§ 197. Infant's contracts for necessaries.—What are the necessaries for the payment of which an infant may bind himself by contract? They include clothing, food, medical aid, and education, and these must comport in quantity and quality with the infant's station in life. If he have a wife and children he is chargeable with necessaries supplied to

them. An infant is not bound by the terms of his contract to pay for necessaries beyond a reasonable price for the articles.

§ 198. Fraud of infants.-If an infant procures goods of a tradesman on a false statement that he was of age the goods can be reclaimed on the ground of fraud. Sometimes courts of equity hold an infant to a contract that he has entered into under a false pretense as to his age. "The privilege of infancy is a shield for his protection and is not to be used as a weapon of injustice."

§ 199. An infant may be bound by an executed contract in a matter where he would not be bound if it were executory. If an infant were to buy a thing, not being necessaries, he could not be compelled to pay for it, but having paid for it he could not recover back the money. If he has put money into a partnership, and has performed services in the business, he can not on rescinding the agreement get back his money and pay for his labor, too. The privilege of infancy is personal, and can only be pleaded by the infant himself; except that if he dies or becomes insane, his heirs, administrator or guardian may avoid his contracts.

§ 200. An infant may disaffirm his contract during minority. If he retains the thing contracted for after he arrives at full age, it is a ratification of the contract. So, if he conveys land after his majority, which he purchased during his infancy, it is an affirmance. And if he has conveyed land during his infancy, and in his majority conveys the same land to another, the latter deed disaffirms the former. Where he elects to disaffirm, he must disaffirm the

whole contract. There can be no ratification of a voidable contract during infancy, for the ratification would be voidable. Retaining after he arrives at majority either goods or land purchased during his infancy makes the contract valid. Some states by their statutes require that a binding ratification of a contract made by an infant can only be made in writing. § 201. Contracts made by persons under duress are not binding. Duress exists where one by the unlawful act of another is induced to make a contract or perform some act under circumstances which deprive him of the exercise of his free will. There may be duress of the person, as by threats, imprisonment, or an exhibition of apparently irresistible force, or of the goods, where one is compelled to submit to an illegal exaction to obtain possession of them. The imprisonment must be unlawful in itself, or if lawful it must be enforced in a cruel and oppressive manner. The threat or threats must be such as to excite fear of some grievous wrong, and such as would overcome the will of a person of ordinary courage. Where a contract is obtained by duress, it is incumbent upon the person who wishes to avoid the contract on that account to proceed without delay. If after the duress he does any act in ratification of the contract, he is cut off from his defense.

§ 202. Insane persons.-As a rule, the contracts of persons of unsound mind are not binding upon them. Unsoundness of mind, as here considered, is such a lack of mental capacity as totally unfits one for the care of his own interests. Of persons of sound mind the law takes no note of the grades of mental capacity between the highest and the lowest.

When, however, from disease or any other cause the individual is or has become of unsound mind, as above indicated, he will not be held to his contracts, and those who deal with him do so at their peril. One who has been put under guardianship as a person of unsound mind is conclusively presumed to be so, and his estate can only be lawfully dealt with by his legally appointed guardian, who acts for him under the direction of the court. As to a person who has not been adjudged to be of unsound mind, the question of his mental capacity, when it is in issue, is to be tried as any other question of fact, the presumption in such cases being that every person is sane until the contrary is shown. It is not necessary here to go into a discussion of the different forms of insanity. We are here concerned only with that class of persons who in law are considered to be incapable of making valid contracts. Even a person of unsound mind may in exceptional cases, as an infant may, make binding contracts, viz., for necessaries suitable to his condition in life, and he will be held to his contract where he has dealt with one who in good faith supposed him to be sane, and has performed the contract by paying the consideration to him, if the consideration can not be restored.

§ 203. Drunkenness.-Where a person is so drunk at the time he makes a contract that he does not understand what he is doing, such contract is voidable, and may be repudiated or ratified by him when he becomes sober. The same exceptions hold good here as in the case of infants and persons of unsound mind. A man when he gets sober can not hold on

to the benefits of a contract made when he was drunk, and repudiate the contract also. A drunken man, as an infant and lunatic, may make a valid contract for necessaries. Slight circumstances will be sufficient to ratify the contract of a drunken man. A delay in disaffirming it if unreasonable, or retain. ing the benefit after he becomes sober, will be a sufficient ratification.

§ 204. Married women.-By the common law married women could not make valid contracts. The extension of the rights of women in most of the states. of the Union has practically emancipated them from the restraints of the common law. In the two states of Wyoming and Colorado women have the right of suffrage equal with men. In Kansas they vote at municipal elections. In other states they vote on questions concerning local school management, and in nearly all the states they have the control and management of their separate estates, and as to such matters the married woman is put upon an equal footing with an unmarried woman, or with her husband. Nearly every session of our state legislatures witnesses some innovation upon the rules of law which have restrained her liberty in dealing with her property. So that it would be foolish here to attempt to state the extent or limitations upon the powers of married women in the matter of contracts. To ascertain what these are recourse must be had to the statute laws of the several states.

§ 205. Corporations.-The power of a corporation to make contracts is limited by the charter creating it, or, where it is organized under a general law, by the terms of that law. A contract entered into by a