Hubbard v. Ruff
| Decision Date | 12 February 1958 |
| Docket Number | No. 37050,No. 2,37050,2 |
| Citation | 97 Ga.App. 251,103 S.E.2d 134 |
| Parties | Stella HUBBARD v. M. L. RUFF et al |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
Syllabus by the Court.
1. A woman as to her separate estate is a feme sole and, with respect to her property rights, is entirely freed from any disabilities of coverture. She may accordingly prosecute an action for damages to her property caused by the negligence of her husband.
2. A petition alleging that the defendant was driving an automobile in excess of the speed limit when he crashed into the plaintiff's truck as the latter was in the act of stopping behind a school bus, sets out a cause of action against such defendant.
3. Punitive damages cannot be recovered in actions for damages resulting from simple negligence where there is no wilful misconduct, malice, fraud, wantonness or oppression.
4. An allegation that the defendant is negligent 'in violation of the regulations of the Highway Department of the State of Georgia' was properly stricken on demurrer.
Stella Hubbard filed an action for damages to property in the Superior Court of Taliaferro County, naming as defendants her husband Lincoln Hubbard, a resident of that county, and Martin Ruff, a resident of Cobb County. The defendant Hubbard did not demur, so far as appears from this record. The defendant Ruff filed general and special demurrers which were sustained, and the exception is to this judgment.
J. A. Mitchell, P. H. Mitchell Crawfordville, Colley & Orr, Wilbur A. Orr, Jr., Washington, for plaintiff in error.
Knox & Neal, Robert E. Knox, Thomson, for defendants in error.
1. Since the court has no jurisdiction of the nonresident defendant if the case fails to set forth a cause of action against the resident defendant, the main question presented for consideration is whether a wife may in this state recover damages for injuries to property negligently caused by her husband. Certain principles of law based upon the marital status are well settled but their effect upon rights of action of a spouse for property damages caused by the other has never been directly passed upon in this state. To quote Justice Gilbert, in Sullivan v. Curling, 149 Ga. 96, 99 S.E. 533, 534, 5 A.L.R. 124, 'In the course of ages evolution has wrought changes, and the changes have wrought some confusion.' The evolution of the legal status of married women, commencing with the common law concept that her existence was completely merged in that of her husband, and continuing through the passage of the 'Married Woman's Act' leaves the common law concept of force and effect except insofar as changed by statute, and the statutes, being in derogation of common law, should be strictly construed. This, and the conclusion to be drawn therefrom that a married woman in this State has no right of action against her husband for a personal tort, have been held in Heyman v. Heyman, 19 Ga.App. 634, 92 S.E. 25; Carmichael v. Carmichael, 53 Ga.App. 663, 187 S.E. 116; Wright v. Wright, 85 Ga.App. 721, 70 S.E.2d 152; Wallach v. Wallach, 94 Ga.App. 576, 95 S.E.2d 750; Foster v. Withrow, 201 Ga. 260, 265, 39 S.E.2d 466. These cases sometimes make the broad statement that one spouse cannot sue another for tort, but in each case they were dealing with or referring to a personal tort, and are construed to mean 'personal tort,' as any other meaning given to the word as used in these cases would render the statements obiter and in conflict with other Supreme Court decisions. A personal tort, as defined in Black's Law Dictionary is 'one involving or consisting in an injury to the person or to the reputation or fellings, as distinguished from an injury or damage to real or personal property, called a 'property tort." None of these cases, accordingly, constitute an adjudication of the question before us, as to whether a wife may bring suit against her husband for negligently causing damages resulting from the injury or destruction of her property.
Property of the wife belonging to her at the time of her marriage or acquired thereafter is her separate property; she is a feme sole as to her separate estate and has power as such to purchase, hold and convey property, contract and be contracted with, sue and be sued. Const. art. 3, § 10, par. 1, Code, § 2-2201; §§ 53-501, 53-502, 53-503; Huff v. Wright, 39 Ga. 41, 43. In Eddleman v. Eddleman, 183 Ga. 766, 189 S.E. 833, 836, 109 A.L.R. 877, the question was first posed in this State as to whether these statutes gave to the wife a status which would permit her to be sued in tort by her husband, and the following was held: The reason given is that 'the tort is founded on violation of property right as distinguished from injury to the person of the plaintiff,' and the Eddleman case quotes with approval from foreign decisions to the effect that statutes such as those relied on here have reference to the 'management, control, and protection of her property rights' and she may 'generally sue the husband for wrongs done to her property.'
While this case was one by the husband against his wife for a property tort committed by her consisting of her conversion of his property, the right of action is recognized in the husband against the wife on the theory that the wife would have this right of action against her husband. The Eddleman case, then, settles once and for all the question that one spouse may sue the other in tort in this State, so far as the action of bail-torver is concerned. There is no logical distinction between a trover action where a money verdict is elected and one electing a property verdict, so it must be presumed that one spouse may also sue another in trover and elect (particularly if the property has been destroyed) to take a money verdict, although the Eddleman case does not deal with this point. And, if a plaintiff may so elect, then there is no logical difference so far as property rights are concerned, between an action in trover for the recovery of the article or its value and an action for damages resulting from injury to or destruction of the article. A cause of action for damages to property resulting from the negligence of the defendant is an action which involves a property right. American Ins. Co. v. Keene, 61 Ga.App. 754(2), 7 S.E.2d 427. It is a right which, more than any other, protects the ownership of property, for without it the tortfeasor would be immune from civil retribution.
Such a cause of action involves a property...
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