Case Name: Mary Ann McCarty vs. Richard De Best & wife
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1876-03-11
Citations: 120 Mass. 89
Docket Number: 
Parties: Mary Ann McCarty vs. Richard De Best & wife.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 120
Pages: 89–89

Head Matter:
Mary Ann McCarty vs. Richard De Best & wife.
Suffolk.
March 9. —11, 1876.
Ames & Morton, JJ., absent.
Since the passage of the St. of 1871, c. 312, a husband cannot be joined in an action for a tort of his wife.
Tort for slander by the female defendant. The answer of the husband set up that he was improperly joined in the action.
At the trial in the Superior Court, before Putnam, J., the de fendants requested the judge to rule that the plaintiff could not recover against the husband, he being improperly joined. This ruling was refused. The jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff ; and the defendants alleged exceptions.
JE. B. Smith, for the defendants.
G. J. Brooks, for the plaintiff, submitted the case without argument.

Opinion:
Gray, C. J.
The St. of 1871, c. 312, was manifestly intended to make the wife alone liable to action, judgment and execution for torts committed by her in the future. This was clearly intimated in Hill v. Duncan, 110 Mass. 238, and was directly adjudged in Austin v. Cox, 118 Mass. 58. The present action having been brought against both husband and wife, for a tort committed by her since the passage of this statute, the exceptions must be
Overruled as to her, and sustained as to him.
" Any married woman may sue and be sued in actions of tort in the same manner as if she were sole, and her husband shall not be liable to pay the judgment against her for damages or costs in any such suit, but the same may be collected out of her property, real or personal; and all sums, recovered by her in any such suit, shall be her sole and separate property."