Dawson v. Dawson

• Decision Date: 26 October 1886
• Citation: 23 Mo.App. 169
• Parties: JAMES DAWSON, Appellant, v. EVA V. DAWSON, Respondent.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

23 Mo.App. 169

JAMES DAWSON, Appellant,

v.EVA V. DAWSON, Respondent.

St. Louis Court of Appeals, Missouri.

Oct. 26, 1886.

APPEAL from the St. Louis County Circuit Court, ELIJAH ROBINSON, Special Judge.

Reversed and decree for the plaintiff.

ALEX. MARTIN, for the appellant: Habitual drunkenness produced by opium is within the spirit of the statute. Barber v. Barber, 14 Laws Rep. 375. Habitual drunkenness produced by opiates is an indignity for which a divorce may be granted. Kimpf v. Kimpf, 34 Mo. 211.

ZACH J. MITCHELL, for the respondent: Intoxication produced by the use of opiates does not constitute drunkenness within the meaning of the statute. Comp. Laws Conn. 378-9.

ROMBAUER, J., delivered the opinion of the court.

This is an action for divorce. Two of the statutory grounds are assigned by the plaintiff: 1. That the defendant has been addicted to habitual drunkenness for the period of one year, next preceding the institution of this suit. 2. That she has offered to the plaintiff such indignities as to render his condition intolerable.

The defendant denied the allegations of the petition and filed a cross-bill on the ground of indignities offered to her. The cause was tried by a special judge selected by the parties, who, upon the hearing of the cause, dismissed both bill and cross-bill, and the plaintiff alone appeals.

For the purpose of considering the two propositions of law which are raised by the record, a preliminary statement of such facts as bear upon them is essential.

The plaintiff is a well-to-do farmer, advanced in years, and was at the date of his marriage a widower, having a family of grown children. The defendant, much younger than the plaintiff, was a childless widow, and a resident of Memphis, Tennessee. The plaintiff made her acquaintance in the summer of 1882, during a short visit to Memphis, and married her in December, 1882, his previous acquaintance with her being very slight. He at once brought her to his farm in St. Louis county, where they continued to live together until November, 1884. At this last date, the defendant, with her infant daughter Bessie, issue of her present marriage, left in company of her sister, a resident of Memphis, for that place on an extended visit. This departure was with the plaintiff's consent.

The present suit was instituted by the plaintiff February 25, 1885, and prior to the defendant's return, and a copy of the petition was served upon her in the city of Memphis.

The evidence introduced upon the hearing established beyond a reasonable doubt, that the defendant, either was already at the date of the marriage a confirmed consumer of opium in its various forms of laudanum and morphine, or that she became such shortly thereafter, and that she continued in the habit during the entire period of co-habitation.

On that subject, the judge who tried the cause, in an opinion embodied in the record, and referred to by both parties, states:

“I am convinced by the great preponderance of the testimony in the cause, that she (the defendant) engaged the servants and employes about the place to procure laudanum and morphine for her; that she procured the same herself on different occasions; that when endeavoring to procure these drugs she assumed a name other than her own for the purpose of concealing her identity; that she visited a neighboring store at an unseemly hour of the night for the puprose of procuring them, and that she endeavored to keep from her husband the knowledge of all these facts.”

This statement is fully borne out by the record, and the learned judge might have added with equal propriety, that she disposed of small proceeds of the farm in exchange for the baneful drug. That when unable to obtain by these means sufficient to satisfy her appetite, she finally put her jewelry in pawn with a storekeeper for the same purpose. Also that the continued use of the drug, exerted its usual effect on her constitution and habits, undermining the former, and rendering her, to a great extent, callous to her surroundings.

As to the ordinary effect of the drug, on those addicted to its continual consumption, a medical expert testifies:

“The absorption of the drug is a dislocation of all functions, it causes the patient to dream the most beautiful dreams, and see the most lovely visions, which are followed by a stage of corresponding depression, which causes the patient to fall as much below, as he has been above the natural plane.”

And again:

“An overdose of alcohol presents almost the same phenomena witnessed in an overdose of morphine, laudanum, or opium, that is, alcoholic coma is induced, in which the symptoms are almost precisely the same.”

As to the effects upon the moral character of the patient, the same expert states:

“It destroys the moral tone. An opium eater is necessarily a liar. No chronic opium eater tells the truth. They will disregard the ordinary requirements of life, They are willing to present themselves in society in a very unenviable light, thinking nothing of it. They disregard the requirements of the household, their relations to their children and family--all these they set at naught.”

An examination of medical authorities on the subject fully confirms this expert testimony. In fact, it must be conceded that the habit of intoxication by opiates, when once thoroughly contracted, becomes incontrollable, and that its results, while in the main the same, are far more baneful than those of alcoholic intoxication.

Another expert, and a physician of very extended experience, testifies that of a great number of cases that came under his...