State v. Arnold

• Decision Date: 09 January 1931
• Docket Number: No. 28077.,28077.
• Citation: 182 Minn. 313,235 N.W. 373
• Parties: STATE v. ARNOLD.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

235 N.W. 373

182 Minn. 313

STATE v. ARNOLD.

No. 28077.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

January 9, 1931.

Appeal from District Court, Blue Earth County; Harry A. Johnson, Judge.

May Arnold was convicted of grand larceny in the first degree, and she appeals.

Reversed.

John E. Regan and A. J. Berndt, both of Mankato, for appellant.

Henry N. Benson, Atty. Gen., James E. Markham, Deputy Atty. Gen., and Frank E. Morse, Co. Atty., of Mankato, for the State.

LORING, J.

Defendant was convicted of grand larceny in the first degree and appeals from an order denying her motion for a new trial. The money for the theft of which she was convicted was approximately $2,000 belonging to her husband.

The appeal squarely raises the question whether or not, in the present state of the law in Minnesota, a wife may be guilty of the larceny of her husband's property. At common law such a crime could not be committed by the wife, nor could a husband commit larceny of his wife's personal property. The theory was that the unity of the spouses in the marriage status precluded the larceny.

It is now contended that, because of the Married Woman's Act (Mason's Minn. St. § 8616 et seq.), and the fact that our Penal Code is purely statutory, a wife is wholly distinct from her husband, in legal status as well as in full control of her property rights, and that she comes within the phrase "every person" as used in the Larceny Statute (Minn. St. 1927, § 10358). We think the logic of the situation leads to the opposite conclusion.

If there were no Married Woman's Act, and the personal status and property rights of married people remained as at common law, there would be no contention that the Larceny Statute, by the mere use of the phrase "every person" included married women.

The case of Commonwealth v. Hartnett, 3 Gray (Mass.) 450, was one where a woman was charged with larceny of property, apparently that of a third person, from a building belonging to her husband. The statute of Massachusetts (St. 1851, c. 156, § 4) provided an increased penalty for "every person who shall commit the offense of larceny by stealing in any building. * * *" The court held that the statute did not apply to a married woman who committed the offense in her husband's building. It based this holding on the construction given by the English courts to the statute of 12 Anne c. 7, passed in 1713 and now repealed, but which had never been in force in Massachusetts. That statute applied to "every person" who committed the offense `in any dwelling house. * * *" The court said: "* * * The construction previously given to the same terms, by the English courts, is the construction to be given to them by our courts. * * * For if it were intended to exclude any known construction of a previous statute, the legal presumption is, that its terms would be so changed as to effect that intention." Our own court has held that we may go to the common law to determine the meaning of common-law terms used in our penal code. Benson v. State, 5 Minn. 19 (Gil. 6).

We may therefore conclude that the use of the phrase "every person" in our Larceny Statute does not of itself, without the aid of the Married Woman's Act, make the defendant a criminal. Is she a criminal by implication? While the rule of strict construction in favor of the accused no longer prevails in this state, we cannot believe that the "fair import" rule justifies the creation of a crime by any implication which may arise out of the Married Woman's Act.

In our opinion the status of marriage has not been modified by the Married Woman's Act, and only property rights and contracts are affected thereby. Our own cases sustain that view. Drake v. Drake, 145 Minn. 388, 177 N. W. 624, 9 A. L. R. 1064, and Strom v. Strom, 98 Minn. 427, 107 N. W. 1047, 6 L. R. A. (N. S.) 191, 116 Am. St. Rep. 387.

The common-law rule that a wife could not commit larceny of her husband's property rested, not alone upon the doctrine that her property and possessions were his, but upon the unity of husband and wife which marriage created; the community of interest in the social institution of marriage. The technical ownership of his wife's personal property by the husband might have been sufficient to protect him if he were accused of its theft, but certainly his ownership and control of her personal property was not alone sufficient to justify the doctrine as to her immunity. Something more was needed to protect her, and that was the unity of the social relationship of marriage, giving the word "social" its broadest meaning.

In the case of State v. Phillips, 85 Ohio St. 317, 97 N. E. 976, 977, 40 L. R. A. (N. S.) 142, Ann. Cas. 1913B, 250, where a woman was accused of larceny of her husband's money, it was contended that the Married Woman's Act had so changed her status that she might be guilty of larceny of her husband's property. The Supreme Court of Ohio, speaking through the Chief Justice, said: "* * * The unity of husband and wife, as recognized in the common law, is founded not merely on a community of goods, but upon the recognized obligation of both to the family and to society. The unit of society is not the individual but the family; and whatever tends to undermine the family, by the irrepealable laws of nature will crumble and destroy the foundations of society and the state. So that the peace and sanctity of the home and family are the ultimate reason for the common-law rule. We do not think that we can safely hold by mere inference that the Legislature has taken such a long step in the direction of destructive legislation."

In the same opinion the court said: "Indeed, we doubt that any member of that body had in contemplation such a result when he voted for the statutes which protect the individual rights of married people. The Legislature was contemplating the expressed purpose of the statutes, and that only. They were not at that time considering crimes and criminal procedure; and surely they cannot be presumed to have intended a thing which they did not clearly express and which is fraught with such far-reaching and radical consequences to the law of the domestic relations, for the abrogation of the doctrine of the legal unity of husband and wife, when pushed to its logical conclusion, would not only create crimes where there were none before, but would also authorize a husband or wife to maintain civil actions for tort against the other, such as actions for personal injuries, assault, false imprisonment, or slander * * * thus multiplying a hundredfold the unhappy differences which have to be settled in the divorce courts. We cannot assume that the Legislature intended this without very clear evidence of such an intention in the language of the statutes."

Judge Cooley, speaking for the Supreme Court of Michigan, in the case of Snyder v. People, 26 Mich. 106, 108, 12 Am. Rep. 302, where a husband was accused of burning his wife's house, in commenting upon the effect of the Married Woman's Act upon the crime of arson, said:

"It remains to be seen whether the statutes have introduced any changes which would affect the case.

"The statutes upon which the question arises, are those for the protection of the rights of married women. But it is to be observed, that those do not in terms go beyond the ensuring to the wife such property as she may own at the marriage, and acquire afterwards, and the giving to her the power to protect, control and dispose of the same in her own name, and free from the interposition of the husband. None of them purports to operate upon the family relations; none of them takes from the husband his marital rights, except as they pertain to property, and none of them relieves him from responsibilities, except as they relate to the wife's contracts and debts. He is still under the common-law obligation to support the wife, and the services of the wife, which at the common law were regarded as the consideration for this support, are still supposed to be performed in his behalf and in his interest, except where they are given to her individual estate, or separate business. The wife has a right to receive her support at the husband's domicil, unless she has lost it by misbehavior, and husband and wife together have a joint interest in and control of the children * * *. The unity of man and woman in the marriage...