850 RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 
§ 246. Inferiority of Colored Persons.—All white male 
citizens are equal before the law of California; but negroes, 
Indians, and Chinamen are not permitted to vote or to testify 
in the courts against white men. In a criminal case, one- 
eighth negro blood and one-half of Indian blood, in civil cases 
one-half of either, disqualifies a witness for testifying against a 
white man. Slavery is forbidden by the constitution. 
§ 247. Laws Favorable to Debtors.—The laws of California 
relating to the collection of debts are very favorable to the 
debtor. His homestead, the property owned by his wife pre- 
viou’ to marriage, that given to her afterward, his household 
furniture to the value of two hundred dollars, his tools, if a 
mechanic, his horse and wagon, if a mechanic, and his library, 
if a lawyer, are exempt from execution. A married man, a 
widow, or widower with children, or any head of a family, is 
entitled to a homestead worth five thousand dollars, secure 
against creditors. An unmarried person may have a home- 
stead worth one thousand dollars. Such laws may prevent 
much oppression of poor people, but they also protect and en- 
courage much rascality. A man may own a homestead worth 
five thousand dollars, and that may include a very elegant 
dwelling. His household furniture, worth as much more, may 
have been presented by some friend to his wife after marriage. 
She may have a separate estate of one hundred thousand 
dollars, and may derive an annual income of ten or twenty 
thousand dollars from it, and both may live in an extravagant 
style, and yet creditors have no hold upon him whatever. 
There is no imprisonment for debt except in cases of fraud, and 
that the laws are so drawn that it is almost impossible to prove. 
One important class of testimony, admissible to prove a man a 
thief or murderer, is not admissible if he be accused of fraud 
in contracting a debt. In trials for obtaining money by false 
pretenses—the most common kind of fraud in contracting 
debts—the oral testimony of witnesses, as to the representa- 
tions made by the accused, is not sufficient to convict ; there 
must be some writing or token furnished by the defendant 
