66 Pa. 494 | Pa. | 1870
— Marriage and the family relation lie at the very basis of social life, and the deep stake society has in their sanctity has led courts to be strict in the construction of the causes of divorce. The cruel and barbarous treatment which is a ground of divorce, a mensa et thoro, under the Act of 1817, has been held to be actual personal violence to the wife, or the reasonable apprehension of it; or such a course of treatment as endangers her life or health, and renders cohabitation unsafe: Butler v. Butler, 1 Pars. Eq. Cas. 344. This definition of Judge King has been frequently approved of. Neither the Act of 1815 nor that of 1817 made cruel and barbarous treatment on part of the wife a cause of divorce for the husband. This was first done by the Act of 8th of May 1854, the 3d section of which made it a cause, “ where the wife shall have, by cruel and barbarous treatment, rendered the condition of her husband intolerable or life burdensome.” In Gordon v. Gordon, 12 Wright 226, this act came up for interpretation, and it was there held that the words cruel and barbarous treatment, therein stated, are to have the same meaning as the same words in the Act of 1817 had received. This we are disposed to adhere to, not only because it comports well with the true policy of the state in preserving the sanctity of the marriage tie, but because it produces consistency in the administration of the law of divorce, and prevents that confusion which arises by nice distinctions drawn between the words of the different acts. But Justice Strong, in delivering the opinion in Gordon v. Gordon, suggested that perhaps the language of the Act of 1815 solves the interpretation of these words by describing them as such treatment as endangers life, and gives as a reason that otherwise the husband may obtain divorce for a less degree of cruelty than would suffice to entitle the wife to a divorce. This being but a supposition, and not advanced as an opinion, we are at liberty to consider it as no more than a bare impression of that learned and able judge. A careful consideration of the Acts of 1815 or 1817, which in this part is a transcript of the former, and the Act of 1854, will convince us that to limit the acts of cruelty and barbarous treatment in the Act of 1854 to those that endanger life alone, is not consistent with its own language or the entire provision of the Acts of 1815 and 1817. The language of the Act of 1854 is: “ When the wife shall have, by cruel and barbarous treatment, rendered the condition of her husband intoleraable or life burdensome.” The language of the Acts of 1815 and 1817 is : “When any husband shall have, by cruel and barbarous treatment, endangered his wife’s life, or offered such indignities to her person as to render her condition intolerable and life burdensome.” It is evident that the legislature, in the Act of 1854, intended to narrow the causes of divorce in the husband’s case to
In view of all the evidence, we are not able to say the court committed any plain mistake. As to the alimony, we cannot say there is anything in the evidence to show that the circumstances of the plaintiff will admit of any increase.
Decree affirmed.