Pullen v. Pullen

• Decision Date: 19 March 1894
• Citation: 28 A. 719,52 N.J.E. 9
• Parties: PULLEN v. PULLEN et al.
• Court: New Jersey Court of Chancery

28 A. 719

52 N.J.E. 9

PULLEN

v. PULLEN et al.

Court of Chancery of New Jersey.

March 19, 1894.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Bill by Ralph A. Pullen against John W. Pullen, Catherine A. Pullen, and others for partition. Heard on motion and petition to open an interlocutory decree and allow complainant to amend the bill by dismissing defendant Catherine A. Pullen as a party. Granted.

The other facts fully appear in the following statement by McGILL, Ch.:

On the 28th of April, 1891, Ralph A. Pullen filed a bill in chancery for the partition of certain lands of which he and others were tenants in common. He and his wife, Catherine A. Pullen, were then living apart. The wife was made a party defendant to the suit, because of her inchoate right of dower in her husband's undivided interest in the land. She answered the bill, claiming her inchoate right. While the partition suit was pending, Mrs. Pullen brought suit in this court against her husband for divorce a vinculo matrimonii, because of his willful, continued, and obstinate desertion of her for three years and upwards. On the 14th of August, 1891, an interlocutory decree and order of reference was made in the partition suit, whereby, among other things, it was referred to a master to ascertain and report the interests of the respective parties to the suit in the lands of which partition is sought. Pending the master's report, on the 28th of October, 1891, a final decree was made in the divorce suit, by which the bond of matrimony between Mr. Pullen and his wife was effectually dissolved. Motion is now made to open the interlocutory decree in order that the complainant, by supplementary pleading, may set up the divorce, and thus raise the question whether or not the inchoate right of Catherine A. Pullen is extinguished, or amend his bill by striking her out as a party defendant.

George O. Vanderbilt, for the motion.

William Y. Johnson, opposed.

McGILL, Ch., (after stating the facts.) The vital question presented and argued is whether the divorce a vinculo matrimonii bars all right of Catherine A. Pullen in the lands. I regard it as now settled that, in absence of express or implied statutory provision to the contrary, such a divorce, for the fault of either party, will bar dower. The reason is that it is essential to the estate that marriage shall subsist at the death of the husband. A woman cannot have dower who is not the wife of the man in whose lands she claims it at the time of his death. Day v. West, 2 Edw Ch. 592. In Calame v. Calame, 24 N. J. Eq. 440, 444, Vice Chancellor...