53 S.E.2d 343 | Ga. | 1949
The assignment of error on a judgment of the trial court overruling a demurrer to a petition of an insane wife by a next friend, seeking temporary and permanent alimony, presents two questions: (1) can such an action be maintained by a next friend; and (2) are the allegations of the amended petition sufficient to show an abandonment of the wife or a separation of the parties entitling the wife to alimony? Held:
1. "A lunatic, or person non compos mentis, having no legal guardian. may sue by any competent person as next friend." Dent v. Merriam,
2. The plaintiff alleged in the original petition that "said plaintiff and said defendant are living in a bona fide state of separation," and in the amendment thereto that "defendant completely abandoned plaintiff at the time of her insanity, and has had no relation with her or done anything for her since that time." The Code, § 30-213, permits a suit for alimony, where there is no action for divorce pending, "when husband and wife shall be living separate, or shall be bona fide in a state of separation." Section 30-210 provides that "permanent alimony shall be granted" not only "in cases of divorce," but "in cases of voluntary separation" as well as "where the wife, against her will, shall either be abandoned or driven off by her husband." Under these sections of our Code, which must be construed in pari materia (Fulenwider v. Fulenwider,
Judgment affirmed. All the Justices concur, except Atkinson, P. J., and Head, J., who dissent from the ruling in the first division of the opinion.