Case ID: scl_15/html/0148-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Alexander Bean vs. Elizabeth Morgan.
    If the husband depart from the state, for the purpose of a residence abroad,- without the intention of returning, such absence renders the wife competent to contract, and to sue and he. sued, as if she were a feme sole.
    This was an action brought upon a note of hand. The defence, relied upon was the coverture of the defendant at the time of executing the note. It appeared that the defendant was married in 1817 to Morgan, who lived with her until some time in 1819, when he left this state and went off, and nothing certain had been he.ard oí him since., The case was tried on summary process.
    Waties, J. who heard the cause, decreed for the plaintiff. The defendant notwithstanding her coverture, was bound by her note to the plaintiff. Her husband Morgan, had left the state to elude his creditors, and as he had not since returned, it-was-fair to presume that he had no intention tp do. so, and that he had abandoned her. By being thus deprived of his aid and protection, she was obliged to provide for herself, and was therefore competent to make contracts and to sue and be sued on them as a Jeme sole ; otherwise she would have no means of. gaining a support. Considering this a plain principle of equity he felt authorised to apply it to a case which was within the equity jurisdiction of the court; and having since looked more fully into the subject, he found the principle was also recognized by the common, law. Clancey, in his essay on the Rights of Married Women, p. 7 to 13, had col-leeted.a number of authorities relating tp it, both at law and in equity, and had drawn from them this conclusion, that “ if the husband depart from the realm, for the purpose of a residence abroad, either voluntarily without an intention of returning, or compulsory without the power of returning, such absence renders the wife capable of contracting, and therefore of ability to sue and be sued, audio acquire and dispose of property, as if she were sole.”
    
    Bauskett, for the defendant,
    cited 1 Com. on Con. 172, 179.
    Butler, contra.
    Clancey 9, 19,1 Dublin ed.
   The court of appeals concurred in opinion with his Honor Judge Waties, and confirmed his decree.

Decree confirmed.