[603] _MSS. Records of the County Court of Middlesex_ (Apr. 1, 1656), I, 80. [604] See the case of Usher _v._ Troop (Throop), 1724-29, in which is raised the question as to whether the "constitutions and canons ecclesiastical of the Church of England" are binding in Massachusetts: _MSS. Records of the Superior Court of Judicature_, 1725-30, fol. 236. _Cf._ chap. xii, secs, i, ii. After the beginning of independent national life the English common law as a whole in its various branches was retained as a part of the law of the land, unless superseded by constitutional or statutory legislation. It was therefore inevitable that the state and federal courts, as cases arose, should declare whether it had been so superseded. There could no longer be any question, as in the colonial period, regarding the competency of the legislator to define the conditions of a valid matrimonial contract. A brief history of the acceptance or rejection of the common-law marriage in the United States, whether by statute or by judicial decree, may now be presented.[605] [605] COOK, "The Mar. Cel. in the U.S.," _Atlantic_, LXI, 520-32, has given a systematic account of the subject to the year 1888. To this article, and to his "Reform in the Celebration of Marriage," _ibid._, 680-90, I am indebted; as also to BENNETT, "Uniformity in Marriage and Divorce Laws," _Am. Law Register_, N. S., XXXV, 221-31. _Cf._ CONVERS, _Mar. and Divorce_, 15-119; STEWART, _Mar. and Divorce_, 78 ff.