Boblitz v. Boblitz, 126

• Citation: 462 A.2d 506,296 Md. 242
• Decision Date: 30 June 1983
• Docket Number: No. 126,126
• Parties: Lauretta Baseman BOBLITZ v. Charles William BOBLITZ.
• Court: Court of Appeals of Maryland

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296 Md. 242 462 A.2d 506 Lauretta Baseman BOBLITZ
v.
Charles William BOBLITZ. No. 126. Court of Appeals of Maryland. June 30, 1983.

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Elena B. Langan and Claude L. Callegary, Baltimore, for appellant.

F. Gray Goudy, Baltimore, for appellee.

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Argued before SMITH, ELDRIDGE, COLE, DAVIDSON, RODOWSKY and COUCH, JJ., and W. ALBERT MENCHINE, Special Judge.

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W. ALBERT MENCHINE, Special Judge.

Lauretta Baseman Boblitz (hereafter Appellant), separated wife of Charles William Boblitz (hereafter Appellee), instituted suit against him in the Superior Court of Baltimore City. The action, sounding in tort, alleged that on August 26, 1978 Appellant sustained serious, painful and permanent injuries as the result of the negligence of Appellee in the operation of a motor vehicle.

In due course, Appellee filed a Motion for Summary Judgment upon the following facts:

"The Defendant moves for Summary Judgment on the ground that there is no genuine dispute between the parties as to any material fact and that the Defendant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law and for reason says that the parties hereto were married on March 4, 1979 and are husband and wife, as witness Plaintiff's Answers to Defendant's Interrogatories No. 21, No. 22 and No. 24 filed herein, and that the alleged cause of action herein was extinguished by said marriage under the authority of Hudson v. Hudson, 226 Md. 521, 174 A.2d 339 (1961)."

The answer of the Appellant admitted the recited facts, disputed the conclusion of law, and further alleged that the parties separated on July 7, 1980; had not resumed a marital relationship since that date; and that there was no hope of a reconciliation.

After hearing, the trial judge, as indeed under the circumstances he was required to do in the face of our prior decision in Hudson, supra, granted summary judgment to

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the Appellee (Defendant below) in an order reading as follows:

"DEFENDANT'S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT GRANTED. HUDSON V. HUDSON, 226 Md. 521 [174 A.2d 339] (1961), CITED IN LUSBY V. LUSBY, 283 Md. 334, 345 [390 A.2d 77] (1978) STILL APPEARS TO BE THE LAW IN MARYLAND, AT LEAST UNTIL IT IS ALTERED BY THE COURT OF APPEALS OR THE LEGISLATURE."

Appellant filed a timely appeal asking us to reexamine the interspousal immunity rule that was the basis for decision in Hudson, supra, and to declare that rule to be no longer viable in tort cases involving personal injury to a spouse resulting from the negligence of the other spouse.

[462 A.2d 507] The interspousal immunity rule, of ancient origin, is a creature of the common law that resulted exclusively from judicial decisions and is thus described by Blackstone:

"By marriage, the husband and wife are one person in law: that is, the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during the marriage, or at least is incorporated and consolidated into that of the husband: under whose wing, protection, and cover, she performs everything; and is therefore called in our law-french a feme-covert, foemina viro co-operta; is said to be covert-baron, or under the protection and influence of her husband, her baron, or lord; and her condition during her marriage is called her coverture. Upon this principle, of a union of person in husband and wife, depend almost all the legal rights, duties, and disabilities, that either of them acquire by the marriage." Book 1, Ch. 15, p. 442

* * *

* * *

"If the wife be injured in her person or her property, she can bring no action for redress without her husband's concurrence, and in his name, as well as her own: neither can she be sued without making the husband a defendant." Id., p. 443

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Application of the words inter spousal immunity to this ancient rule of law borders on mockery. It would be more aptly called "a rule in derogation of married women." Under it the person and property of a woman upon marriage came under the "protection and influence" of her husband--for good or ill. She became subservient to his will and fitted with a distasteful yoke of servitude and compelled obeisance that was galling at best and crushing at worst.

As women's role in society changed, the burden of this imputation of inferiority became increasingly intolerable and led to an ever increasing storm of protest.

This storm of protest, reaching hurricane proportions in the second half of the Nineteenth Century, caused the Legislatures of the several states to enact "Married Womens Acts."

Maryland's "Married Womens Act," ¹ enacted in 1898, now is codified as Article 45, Section 5 of the Annotated Code of Maryland, and reads as follows:

"Married women shall have power to engage in any business, and to contract, whether engaged in business or not, and to sue upon their contracts, and also to sue for the recovery, security or protection of their property, and for torts committed against them, as fully as if they were unmarried; contracts may also be made with them, and they may also be sued separately upon their contracts, whether made before or during marriage, and for wrongs independent of contract committed by them before or during their marriage, as fully as if they were unmarried; and upon judgments recovered against them, execution may be issued as if they were unmarried; nor shall any husband be liable upon any contract made by his wife in her own name and upon her own responsibility, nor for any tort committed separately

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by her out of his presence, without his participation or sanction." (Emphasis added)

Two years later the General Assembly added what is now Code (1957) Art. 45, Section 20:

"A married woman may contract with her husband and may form a copartnership with her husband or with any other person or persons in the same manner as if she were a feme sole, and upon all such contracts, partnership or otherwise, a married woman may sue and be sued as fully as if she were a feme sole."

The passage of Married Womens Acts in the several states soon produced litigation directed to the question of their meaning and effect.

[462 A.2d 508] The decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Thompson v. Thompson, 218 U.S. 611, 31 S.Ct. 111, 54 L.Ed. 1180 (1910) was the bellwether for early decisions interpreting Married Womens Acts.

In Thompson, the Supreme Court was called upon to determine whether the District of Columbia Act conferred upon a wife the right to maintain a tort action against her husband.

The District of Columbia statute ² as incorporated in the Thompson opinion (218 U.S. at 615, 31 S.Ct. at 111, 54 L.Ed. at 1181-82) read as follows:

"Married women shall have power to engage in any business, and to contract, whether engaged in business or not, and to sue separately upon their contracts, and also to sue separately for the recovery, security, or protection of their property, and for torts committed against them, as fully and freely as if they were unmarried; contracts may also be made with them, and they may also be sued separately upon their contracts, whether made before or during marriage, and for wrongs independent of

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contract, committed by them before or during their marriage, as fully as if they were unmarried; and upon judgments recovered against them execution may be issued as if they were unmarried; nor shall any husband be liable upon any contract made by his wife in her own name and upon her own responsibility, nor for any tort committed separately by her out of his presence, without his participation or sanction: Provided, That no married woman shall have power to make any contract as surety or guarantor, or as accommodation drawer, acceptor, maker, or indorser." (Emphasis added)

The Supreme Court said: (at p. 618 of 218 U.S., p. 112 of 31 S.Ct., p. 1182 of 54 L.Ed.)

"The statute was not intended to give a right of action as against the husband, but to allow the wife, in her own name, to maintain actions of tort which, at common law, must be brought in the joint names of herself and husband.

This construction we think is obvious from a reading of the statute in the light of the purpose sought to be accomplished. It gives a reasonable effect to the terms used, and accomplishes, as we believe, the legislative intent, which is the primary object of all construction of statutes.

It is suggested that the liberal construction insisted for in behalf of the plaintiff in error in this case might well be given, in view of the legislative intent to provide remedies for grievous wrongs to the wife; and an instance is suggested in the wrong to a wife rendered unable to follow the avocation of a seamstress by a cruel assault which might destroy the use of hand or arm; and the justice is suggested of giving a remedy to an artist who might be maimed and suffer great pecuniary damages as the result of injuries inflicted by a brutal husband.

Apart from the consideration that the perpetration of such atrocious wrongs affords adequate

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grounds for relief under the statutes of divorce and alimony, this construction would, at the same time, open the doors of the courts to accusations of all sorts of one spouse against the other, and bring into public notice complaints for assault, slander, and libel, and alleged injuries to property of the one or the other, by husband against wife, or wife against husband."

The Court referring further to "alternative remedies" said:

"Nor is the wife left without remedy for such wrongs. She may resort to the criminal courts, which, it is to be presumed, will inflict punishment commensurate with the offense committed. She may sue for divorce or separation and for alimony. The court, in protecting her rights and awarding relief in such cases, [462 A.2d 509] may consider, and, so far as possible, redress her wrongs and protect her rights." At p. 619 of 218 U.S., p. 113 of 31 S.Ct., p. 1183 of 54 L.Ed.

At another point in the opinion the Court stated at p. 615 of 218 U.S., p. 111 of 31 S.Ct., at page...