Howarth v. Warmser
Illinois Supreme Court
Appeal from the Circuit Court of St. Clair county; the Hon. Joseph Gillespie, Judge, presiding. This action was originally brought before a justice of the peace, by Leopold Warmser and Hath an Gutman, partners, doing business as Warmser & Co., against James Howarth and Margaret, his wife.
Read the full summary
Appeal from the Circuit Court of St. Clair county; the Hon. Joseph Gillespie, Judge, presiding. This action was originally brought before a justice of the peace, by Leopold Warmser and Hath an Gutman, partners, doing business as Warmser & Co., against James Howarth and Margaret, his wife. The plaintiffs recovered a judgment, from which an appeal was taken to the circuit court, where the case was tried, by consent of parties, upon the following statement of facts: That on the 20th of October, A. D. 1869, Margaret Schiele, being a feme sole, doing business in the city of Belleville, and being…
1Opinion of the CourtChief Justice Lawrence
We held, in Connor v. Berry, 46 Ill. 370, and McMurtry v. Webster, 48 ib. 123, that the husband was still, as at common law, liable for the debts of his wife, contracted before marriage, notwithstanding the act of 1861, because that act still left to the husband the wife’s earnings. Since those decisions were made, the legislature, by the act of 1869, has taken from the husband all control over the earnings of his wife, and thus swept away the last vestige of the reasons upon which the common law rule rested. The rule itself must now cease. Legislative action has virtually abolished it, by…
2Cases cited1 opinion
- Connor v. BerryIllinois Supreme Court · 1868
3Cited by3 opinions
- Haight v. McVeaghIllinois Supreme Court · 1873
- Welch v. DavisAppellate Court of Illinois · 1950
- Clark v. ClarkAppellate Court of Illinois · 1893