In Mima Queen v. Hepburn (1813) 11 U.S. 290, Chief Justice Marshall stated that hearsay evidence is, in its own nature, inadmissible: Chief Justice Marshall stated, on the subject of hearsay evidence in his opinion as follows: "In our case, the identifying witness, at the trial, identified one of the defendants but could not identify the other. Indeed, as a second defendant, the nearest she came to identification was that of a spectator, one Emmet Hamilton, although the second defendant was in the courtroom. Then, when asked what she did in making the photographic identification, she said: "Well, I looked through the photographs and I picked out a picture, and I said this, I believe, is the man that was in the robbery." "That this species of testimony supposes some better testimony that might be adduced in the particular case is not the sole ground of the exclusion. Its intrinsic weakness, its incompetency to satisfy the mind of the existence of the fact and the frauds that might be practiced under its cover combine to support the rule that hearsay evidence is inadmissible." "The danger of admitting hearsay evidence is sufficient to admonish courts of justice against lightly yielding to the introduction of fresh exceptions to an old and well-established rule." "It was very justly observed by a great judge that `all questions upon the rules of evidence are of vast importance to all orders and degrees of men: our lives, our liberty, and our property are all concerned in the support of these rules, which have been matured by the wisdom of ages, and are now revered from their antiquity and the good sense in which they are founded.' "One of these rules is, that `hearsay' evidence is in its own nature inadmissible. That this species of testimony supposes some better testimony which might be adduced in the particular case, is not the sole ground of its exclusion. Its intrinsic weakness, its incompetency to satisfy the mind of the existence of the fact, and the frauds which might be practiced under its cover, combine to support the rule that hearsay evidence is totally inadmissible. "To this rule there are some exceptions which are said to be as old as the rule itself. These are cases of pedigree, of prescription of custom, and in some cases of boundary. There are also matters of general and public history which may be received without that full proof which is necessary for the establishment of a private fact."