Case Name: Samuel W. Church, Libellant, versus Mehitable Church
Court: Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Jurisdiction: Massachusetts
Decision Date: 1807-09
Citations: 2 Tyng 157
Docket Number: 
Parties: Samuel W. Church, Libellant, versus Mehitable Church.
Judges: 
Reporter: Massachusetts Reports
Volume: 3
Pages: 134–135

Head Matter:
Samuel W. Church, Libellant, versus Mehitable Church.
A libel for a divorce alleging that the respondent, within five years last past, hag deserted the libellant, and committed the crime of adultery, is insufficient.
This was a libel for a divorce a vinculo matrimonii for the cause of adultery. The allegation was, that the respondent, within five years last past, has deserted the libellant, and committed the crime of adultery.
[The oath of calumny is not peculiar to a suit for a divorce. It is required in ail cases by the Roman law; and of both parties.—Ed.]

Opinion:
By the Court.
The charge is too loose. It is impossible for the respondent to know, under such a general allegation as this, to what charge she has to answer. The allegations ought to be so certain and definite that the attorney-general may have the means of prosecuting the offenders. This offence seems growing to an alarming degree. The particeps criminis must be named, or there must be. an averment that he is unknown to the libellant. The libel was afterwards amended .
Gold, for the libellant .
Note. The chief justice observed that there was an excellent provision in the civil law, that every libel for a divorce shall be supported by the oath of the party that he knows or believes all the allegations in the libel to be true.
[Choate vs. Choate, post, 391.—Ed.]