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33 Ala. 175

Rogers v. Boyd

Supreme Court of Alabama

Decided June 15, 1858

Supreme Court of Alabama · decided 1858-06-15

Heard before the Hon. James B. Clark. This hill was filed by Simeon Rogers, the appellant, against the administrator of his deceased wife, alleging, in substance, that he and his deceased wife were… Held: in the case of Weems v. Bryan and Wife, 21 Ala. 302, 308, to retroact upon the estate of the wife, so as to entitle the husband to its income.

Relies on Pickens v. Oliver · Gibson v. Marquis · Durden v. McWilliams

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1858-06-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 9 later decisions — most recently March 1923

9 state decisions

4018581860187018801890190019101920decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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STONE, J.

¶1The present suit was instituted by the husband of the intestate, and, so far as the record discloses, the creditors do not desire to charge their debts upon the estate. Hence, we are not called upon to decide whether they have any, and if any, what rights in refer-*181once to this property. It will be time enough to consider their rights, when they invoke their consideration.

¶2Neither are we required, by anything apparent upon this record, to decide how far a married woman, having a separate estate, created either by contract or by law, can by contract fasten a charge upon her separate estate, which courts of equity will enforce in favor of creditors. That subject was under discussion in the cases of Hoot v. Sorrelle, 11 Ala. 386; Baker v. Gregory, 28 Ala. 544; Daniels, Elgin & Co. v. Sprague and Wife, 31 Ala. 444; Gibson v. Marquis and Wife, 29 Ala. 668.

¶3Nor does the complainant in his bilí show that he was entitled to have the estate distributed. He alleges no ground for asking a distribution.—Code, § 1821.

¶4Before the act of 1850, if a wife, having a separate estate, permitted her husband to have and use its rents, income and profits, the law presumed she made him a present of them, and he was not liable to account for them.—Roper v. Roper, 29 Ala. 247. The act of 1850 and the Code, by express terms, constituted the husband trustee of the wife’s separate estate, and relieved him from liability to account for rents, income and profits. This provision, from the time of its enactment, fastened itself upon estates of married women held under the act of 1848.—Weems v. Bryan, 21 Ala. 302; Durden and Wife v. McWilliams & Smith, 31 Ala. 438; Pickens v. Oliver, 29 Ala. 528; Daniels, Elgin &. Co. v. Sprague and Wife, 31 Ala. 444.

¶5In Durden and Wife v. McWilliams & Smith, supra, we considered the question of the liability of the separate estates of married women for family supplies, under section 1987 of the Code.—See that case, and Ravesies and Wife v. Stoddart & Co., 32 Ala. The liability there declared, is not one created for the benefit of the husband, ■ but for the benefit of the creditor, and possibly for her own support and protection.

¶6With these explanatory remarks, we cordially adopt the arguments and conclusions of the chancellor.

¶7Decree affirmed.

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