Case Name: Simeon Smith, plaintiff in error, vs. George T. Rogers, defendant in error
Court: Supreme Court of Georgia
Jurisdiction: Georgia
Decision Date: 1854-08
Citations: 16 Ga. 479
Docket Number: No. 50
Parties: Simeon Smith, plaintiff in error, vs. George T. Rogers, defendant in error.
Judges: 
Reporter: Georgia Reports
Volume: 16
Pages: 479–481

Head Matter:
No. 50.
Simeon Smith, plaintiff in error, vs. George T. Rogers, defendant in error.
An insolvent debtor is not entitled to have as many as two watches exempt from sale. It is doubtful whether he is entitled to have even one.
[2.J Nor is he entitled to have exempt his wife’s “implements or tools” of 11 trade or calling”.
Ga. Sa. in Monroe Superior Court. Decision by Judge Warner, February Term, 1854.
The defendant was arrested under a ca. sa. He filed his schedule, preparatory to taking the benefit of the Insolvent Debtor’s Act. At the hearing he moved the Court to exempt from sale a silver watch, claiming the same as a part of his “ wearing apparel” ; also a piano and guitar, for the use of his wife, who was a “music teacher”.
The Court refused the motion, upon the grounds—
1st. Because the wife had claimed and been allowed a gold watch.
2d. Because the defendant was a gunsmith and dentist;; and as such, had been allowed the “implements of his trade”..
To which decision Counsel for defendant excepted.
Hammond, for plaintiff in error.. ‘
Stubbs & Hill, for defendant in error.

Opinion:
By the Court.
Benning, J.
delivering the opinion..
The general rule is, that all of a man's estate, both real and' personal, is subject to be sold under execution, for the payment of his debts. (Jud. Act of 1799, §31.)
The estate of the wife.is the. estate of the husband. This, too, is the general rule.
Various articles of property, however, have, from time to time, been exempted by the Legislature, from this liability. But among these articles is not to be found watches, unless they come under the head of "wearing apparel". It is doubtful whether they, can be made to come under that head. If, however;, they can, we think that not more than one can be made to dó so¡ And one, and the best one, the Court allowed •to be exempt-in this case.
Nor are pianos and guitars to be found, byname, among the-exempted articles. , If, therefore, they are exempt, it must be because they are included-in some of those which are named. It was insisted that they are included in the expressions— "common tools of his trade", "the working tools or implements of my trade or calling".
But that could not be so; for the debtor was not a music teacher, but was a gunsmith and dentist; and these are not the tools or implements of the trade or calling of a gunsmith or dentist.
It is true that his wife was a music teacher; but the Acts, none of them, exempt the tools or implements of the wife's trade or calling. They only exempt those of the debt- or's, himself. Hers, therefore, must be held still to remain governed by the general law. And that subjects them to gale for the husband's debts. (Cobb's Dig. 380, 385, et seq.)