312 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



Michigan was Completed, so that married women are well nigh gmsficipated 

 altogether from marital restraint so far as concerns their property, while the 

 husband's own rights are exceedingly precarious. 



It was enacted "that the real and personal estate of every female, acquired 

 before marriage, and all property, real and personal, to which she may after- 

 ward become entitled by gift, grant, inheritance, devise, or in any other 

 manner, shall be and remain the estate and property of such female, and shall 

 not be liable for the debts, obligations, and engagements of her husband, and 

 may be contracted, sold, transferred, mortgaged, conveyed, devised, or 

 bequeathed by her, in the same manner and with the like effect as if she were 

 unmarried^" It was further enacted that " actions may be brought by and. 

 against a married woman in relation to her sole property in the same manner 

 afi if she were unmarried." 



It will be observed that the statutes securing to a married woman her 

 separate property have removed her common law disability, and give her all 

 the powers as to such property as though she were unmarried. But they have 

 no application to the interests the wife may have in the property of her hus- 

 band. As to such interests, the common law disability remains, except as it is 

 expressly removed by other statutes. She can sell and dispose of her property 

 without his consent. If she owns the homestead on which he and she live, she 

 can sell it over his head. If he owns it he cannot dispose of it without her 

 consent. She can mortgage her own property, but he cannot mortgage his 

 household furniture or farming utensils without she joins in the mortgage. If 

 he dies she is entitled to the use of one-third of his lands for and during her 

 life. If she dies he acquires no interest whatever in her real estate. Nobody 

 will buy a foot of land unless she joins in the deed freely and voluntarily; but 

 she can sell without his knowledge or consent. So that, respecting her 

 individual property, the farmer's wife may be independent. 



Prior to these statutes the sole deed of a married woman was void. She 



could not sell without her husband's consent, nor deed directly to him. Her 



contracts were void. She could neither give nor sell without his consent. 



Now she can make a note, sign a bond or mortgage, and be an independent 



party to a lawsuit, just like a man. If a man commits an assault and battery 



upon her, she can sue him in her own name for damages, and whatever 



damages she recovers becomes her own individual property. Indeed, so far as 



her property is concerned, the farmer's wife can do just about as she pleases. 



Some husbands are inclined to say to their wives what the Irishman said to 



the steam engine : *' You may ploff and ploff, but, be jabers, you can't vote." 



After forty years' trial of these statutes in relation to the rights of woman 



respecting her own property there seems to be no disposition anywhere to 



return to the old common law system. Experience and observation have 



demonstrated that these laws are wholesome and what they should be, and the 



case remains yet to be reported where a true woman has dissipated her property 



to the serious detriment of her family. We have among us a class of young 



men, and they are growing more and more numerous every day, who have no 



ambition but to live upon and dissipate the accumulations of others. These 



are fortune hunters. They profess to believe that any fool can inherit a 



fortune or marry one, but that it takes a man of genius, spirit, and energy to 



make his own fortune. There are, however, a great many young men left 



who are too ambitious to marry for the mere consideration of dollars and 



cents, who have faith in their own abihty to make a fortune for themselves, 



and do not depend upon what their wives may have. Upon the whole, the 



