What is legitimation?
Legitimation is the process that fathers use (other than marriage to the mother) to establish parental rights to their children who were born out of wedlock. Without legitimation, such fathers have no right to custody or visitation of those children (although the laws say they have the obligation to support them financially). Without legitimation, mothers have sole custody of children born out of wedlock. Also, children born out of wedlock do not automatically have the right to inherit from their fathers.
