Case Name: MARY FINNIGAN, Appellant, v. THE HIBERNIA SAVINGS & LOAN SOCIETY et al., Respondents
Court: Supreme Court of California
Jurisdiction: California
Decision Date: 1883-05-11
Citations: 63 Cal. 390
Docket Number: 
Parties: MARY FINNIGAN, Appellant, v. THE HIBERNIA SAVINGS & LOAN SOCIETY et al., Respondents.
Judges: 
Reporter: California Reports
Volume: 63
Pages: 390–391

Head Matter:
[Department One.
May 11, 1883.]
MARY FINNIGAN, Appellant, v. THE HIBERNIA SAVINGS & LOAN SOCIETY et al., Respondents.
Husband and Wife—Eabnings of Wife.—Under section 168 of the Civil Code, the earnings of the wife are not liable for the debts of the husband.
Appeal from a judgment of the Superior Court of the city and county of San Francisco, and from an order refusing a new trial.
The lower court found that the plaintiff and the defendant Daniel Finnigan were husband and wife, and had been such since the year 1850, and that while this relation existed plaintiff made the sum of $1,874.29, by renting rooms and conducting a saloon business, within five years last past, and that during this time the defendant Daniel Finnigan contributed nothing to the support of the plaintiff or his family, and that plaintiff and defendant did not cohabit, because cohabitation was disagreeable to plaintiff, and because she refused to cohabit with the defendant Daniel Finnigan. She was not a sole trader. She deposited the money in bank, and it was seized under an execution against the husband.
Charles F. Hanlon, for Appellant.
A. A. Fardom, for Respondents.

Opinion:
Per Curiam.
The respondents' proposition in this case is, that money earned by a wife may be taken for the debt of her husband. The question is solved by a provision of the Code not referred to by counsel on either side. It is section 168 of the Civil Code, and reads: " The earnings of the wife are not liable for the debts of the husband."
That part of the judgment appealed from, together with the order denying the motion for a new trial, reversed, and cause remanded,