VanDuzer v. VanDuzer

• Decision Date: 03 March 1887
• Citation: 70 Iowa 614,31 N.W. 956
• Parties: VANDUZER v. VANDUZER.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

70 Iowa 614

31 N.W. 956

VANDUZER

v.VANDUZER.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

March 3, 1887.

Appeal from circuit court, Adair county.

The parties are husband and wife. Plaintiff brought an action for divorce and alimony, alleging in her petition that defendant had been guilty of cruel and inhuman conduct, endangering her life. In an amended and substituted petition, subsequently filed, she withdrew her prayer for a divorce from defendant, and asked only for alimony. On a hearing the circuit court awarded her judgment for $4,200, payable in three installments. Defendant appealed.Wolf & Landt and Charles S. Fogg, for appellant.

E. Willard, for appellee.

REED, J.

The parties were married in March, 1855. At that time they lived in Scott county, and they continued to live there until 1876, when they removed to Adair county. When they were married, they were possessed of but little of this world's goods; but they were industrious, economical, and prudent in the management of their affairs, and at the time of their separation, which occurred in December, 1883, they were in good circumstances. They owned a well-improved farm of 150 acres, and had about them the amount of stock and other property usually kept on farms of that size, and defendant had money and evidences of indebtedness to the amount of $2,500 or $3,000. Substantially all of this property was accumulated by their joint efforts after their marriage. Plaintiff not only did the work in and about their house, but she often assisted defendant in his work on the farm. She frequently drove the reaper when they were harvesting their small grain, and she generally assisted in gathering the corn in the fall. It appears, however, that she did this voluntarily, and not at the direction or command of her husband. They had six children, some of whom are married and settled in life, while others were living with them at the time of the separation.

Plaintiff's complaint is that, during the time she lived with defendant, he, on several occasions, committed acts of violence against her; that he is a man of violent and ungovernable temper and strong animal passion, and that he compelled her to submit to excessive sexual intercourse with him; that he is of a jealous and unreasonable disposition; and that without cause he became suspicious of her, and accused her of being unchaste, and of having committed adultery, and that he made these charges in the presence of their children, and published them among their neighbors and relatives. And she alleges that her health and peace of mind were destroyed by his abuse, and false and groundless charges and slanderous publications concerning her, and that she was thereby compelled, for her own safety and peace, to abandon him and their home, and seek support and protection elsewhere. In her petition she enumerates five occasions in which she alleges he was guilty of personal violence towards her. There is great conflict in the evidence as to whether any violence at all was committed on some of the occasions referred to by her; and, as to those transactions in which defendant admits that he used some degree of force towards her, there is great conflict as to the extent of the violence used, and the injuries inflicted. But, accepting as true all that plaintiff testified to with reference to the several transactions, we think that, standing alone, they do not entitle her to a judgment either for a divorce or separate maintenance. To entitle the wife to a divorce on the ground of cruelty the acts complained of must be of such a nature as to justify a belief that the continuance of the co-habitation would be dangerous to her life or health. Cole v. Cole, 23 Iowa, 433;Knight v. Knight, 29 Iowa, 599;Beebe v. Beebe, 10 Iowa, 133.

According to plaintiff's own story, the acts of violence of which she complains were not of a serious character. Nor did she receive any injuries that were at all dangerous to either life or health. She made no complaint to her relatives of the injuries she claimed to have received until after the separation, although, with a single exception, they occurred years before that; and other matters of difference between her and her husband were in the mean time the subject of frequent discussion between her and them. Nor were they the occasion of the separation. It may be conceded that the evidence with reference to those transactions shows that defendant was arbitrary and dictational, and that he is not possessed of the highest sense of what is due from a husband to his wife. But his conduct, although reprehensible, was not characterized by that degree of cruelty and inhumanity which in the eyes of the law will justify either a divorce or a separation. We think, also, that the allegation that he compelled plaintiff to submit to excessive sexual indulgence, to the injury of her health, was not proven.

One remarkable feature of the case, however, remains to be considered. Before she made the acquaintance of defendant, plaintiff was engaged to be married to a man by the name of J. V D. Lewis, who is a relative of hers. Her father at one time gave his consent to this engagement, but subsequently became dissatisfied with something which he claimed Lewis had done. He forbade him to come about his house, and, in consequence of this, the engagement between him and plaintiff was broken off. Lewis afterwards married another woman, and moved away from Scott county, and he and plaintiff did not meet again until about two years before her removal to Adair county. At that time Lewis lived in Audubon county. Plaintiff and defendant being on a visit to a brother of hers who lived in Guthrie, they went, accompaniedby her brother, on a visit to Lewis. They repeated the visit during the following year, and, after their removal to Adair county, they visited him frequently, and he and his wife visited them at their home, and Lewis, being a carpenter,...