Court Opinion

ID: 9812727
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 22:46:09.034147+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:26:06.567861
License: Public Domain

Montgomery, J.,
dissenting. I still am of the opinion that the law on the subject of the right of a married woman to dispose of her separate estate, whether it consists of real or personal property, was properly decided in the case of Walton v. Bristol, 125 N. C., 419. The opinion in this case overrules that case. In Walton v. Bristol, supra, the Court said: “The Constitution, as we have seen, so far as the wife’s power to convey her separate estate is concerned, makes no difference between real property and personal property. If she undertakes to convey either species of property, the written assent of her husband must be had.” Article X, section 6, of the Constitution is in these words: “The real and personal property of any female in this State, acquired before *679marriage, and all property, real and personal, to which sbe may, after marriage, become in any "manner entitled, shall be and remain the sole and separate estate and property of such female, and shall not be liable for any debts, obligations or engagements of her husband, and may be devised and bequeathed, and, with the written assent of her husband, conveyed by her as if she were unmarried.”
It will be seen from reading that section of the Constitution that the words “real and personal property” are always associated, and that the copulative conjunction “and,” leading the last clause, connects both real and personal property with the mode of conveying them. If inconveniences arise practically in the disposition of small articles of personal property by the wife, the written assent of the husband being required, the difficulties are created by the section of the Constitution above quoted, and this Court cannot dispense with them. I can add nothing to what I said for the Court in Walton v. Bristol, supra.