Court Opinion

ID: 9808122
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 20:28:31.595068+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:09:05.060638
License: Public Domain

Clark, J.,
concurring in the result. I do not assem to some of the reasoning of the Court, which, it seems to me,, is contrary to the intent of the statute, and which is likely to shake the security of all titles in which a married woman is joined. It Avas, as is well knoAvn, to cure this effect of a decision of this Court that a privy examination did not have the effect of a tine and recovery (as had been understood by the profession), that Chapter 389, Laws 1889, Avas passed. It would be a singular result if “fraud, duress and undue influence” can not impair the validity of a privy examination if unknown to the grantee, but that a mere irregularity in the form of a question asked a feme covert, or her evasive reply, which is equally known to the grantee, should avail to set aside the solemn certificate of the officer of the law appointed to take her examination. He may die, and then the security c-f title to property for which full Aalue has been paid, and which has been taken hby the grantee in full reliance upon the certificate in due form by the officer appointed by the law, depends not thereon but upon the woman’s recollection, after the lapse of years, of the precise form of Avord3 she used. It is not thus, I think, that this Court has understood the statute. Butner v. Blevins, 125 N. C., 585; Bank v. Ireland, 122 N. C., 571; Riggan v. Sledge, 116 N. C., 87. In England, and in probably all the States which have a clause in their Constitutions as to the property rights of married women similar to that in our Constitution, no privy examination of a_ married woman is noAV required. If her recollection of what she Avas asked or ansAvers can prevail over the certificate of the officer, the sooner the requirement of a privy examination is abolished in our State, the better it will be for those who take title to realty by a deed in which a married woman must join.