HUSBAND AND WIFE 



2879 



HUSBAND AND WIFE 



The fury of a tropical hurricane is almost 

 indescribable; in its path sfiips are torn from 

 their anchors, substantial buildings are blown 

 to pieces, fruit and sugar plantations are de- 

 stroyed and great trees are uprooted; and the 

 waves whipped up on the sea by hurricane 

 winds are the largest known to mariners. A 

 destructive storm of September, 1889, while 

 on its way from the West Indies to the Caro- 

 lina coast, produced a high surf on the New 

 Jersey beaches, though the storm area was a 

 thousand miles distant. Hurricanes are closely 

 related to the destructive tornadoes that occur 

 in the Mississippi Valley, but the tornado has 

 a smaller diameter and is more violent than 

 the hurricane. Both are classed as cyclonic 

 storms. See CYCLONE ; TORNADO. 



Consult Ferrell's Popular Treatise on the 

 Winds. 



HUSBAND AND WIFE, the term, both in 

 a legal and a popular usage, for a man and a 

 woman who are married to each other. 



Common Law Status. Under the old English 

 common law, which forms the basis of most 

 laws to-day in England, Canada and the 

 United States, the husband and wife were 

 accounted one person, and that one person 

 was the husband. When a woman married, 

 she became a part and a minor part, at that 

 of her husband; she was civiliter mortua, 

 which means dead as a citizen. Her property, 

 unless it was most carefully and rigidly secured 

 for her before marriage, became absolutely her 

 husband's, and he might dispose of it or will 

 it away as he chose. Her clothes were not her 

 own, nor were her earnings or her children. 

 She could make no contracts ; she could not sue 

 or be sued. For centuries she could not even 

 have redress for wrongs or actual brutality 

 at her husband's hands, since legally she was 

 a part of him, and so she was entirely at his 

 mercy. Any crime committed by a woman 

 was charged to her husband; it was taken for 

 granted that she had acted under coercion and 

 by his orders. Her husband was legally re- 

 sponsible for any scandal or libel uttered by 

 his wife. This unfairness and inequality con- 

 tiaued through many centuries. 



The only circumstances -under which a mar- 

 ried woman was treated as a responsible person 

 were in case she was married to an alien or a 

 convict, or in the event that her husband had 

 been banished. In that case her property 

 remained her own, she might enter into con- 

 tracts, sue or be sued as a feme sole, the old 

 legal phrase for a single woman. 



Present Status of Husband and Wife. It 



is the tendency to-day to modify the laws 

 which discriminate so unfairly against women, 

 to work toward a real equality. But the prog- 

 ress in the direction of better laws is slow, 

 and it is uneven ; some of the states and prov- 

 inces are still in the Dark Ages as far as fair 

 legislation for women is concerned, and even 

 in the most progressive and enlightened com- 

 munities too many of the absurdities of the 

 old common law still linger. 



Common Law Survivals. In connection with 

 the facts recited below, it must be borne in 

 mind that the laws on the subject are far 

 from uniform. The statements apply to the 

 majority of conditions. To-day the husband 

 still determines the place of residence; but 

 since the introduction of divorce he cannot 

 force his wife to live in an unhealthful climate 

 or under conditions which are too trying, for 

 he lays himself open thereby to the charge of 

 cruelty. But under most laws the husband can 

 lock his wife up to keep her from leaving him, 

 forbid her to visit her family, compel her to 

 go to a specified church, restrain her from 

 squandering money, keep her from bad com- 

 pany and punish her to a slight extent. Con- 

 fined under such circumstances, the wife has 

 no right of habeas corpus (which see). The 

 wife has no corresponding rights over her hus- 

 band's liberty. Wife-beating, however, which 

 once flourished, is now a severe charge against 

 a husband. 



Support and Earnings. A husband is bound 

 to support his wife in a ratio with his income 

 and ability, unless his wife has forfeited her 

 right by misconduct, has waived it voluntarily, 

 or is able to support herself. The wife, how- 

 ever, has no right to her husband's services, 

 although in most jurisdictions the husband has 

 the absolute disposal of his wife's time, services 

 and earnings. In Tennessee, notably, any 

 wage-earning wife must notify her employer 

 in writing that she and her children are de- 

 pendent on herself for, support, or her earnings 

 are her husband's. 



Property Rights. In most states the woman's 

 property automatically becomes her husband's 

 with the conclusion of the marriage ceremony. 

 By prenuptial settlement the wife may have a 

 separate estate; without such a settlement, the 

 use, rents and profits from his wife's real estate 

 and all her personal property go to the hus- 

 band. 



Husband's Liability. The husband is liable 

 for debts which his wife contracted before 



