179 Ind. 583 | Ind. | 1913
Appellant sued appellee for a divorce and she appeared and asked an allowance of $200 for attorney’s fees that she might make her defense. After a hearing on this question the court ordered appellant to pay to appellee the sum named within five days. From this interlocutory order this appeal is brought.
The basis of the claim made in behalf of appellant that the order was improperly made is that it is made to appear that appellee had ample means and credit of her own to enable her to- support herself and make her defense and that therefore the allowance was an abuse of the discretion possessed by trial courts in such cases.
Appellee’s verified application for the allowance shows that the parties were married in 1880 and were separated
In a verified statement in opposition to the allowance, filed by appellant, it is shown that at the time of their marriage he owned 80 acres of land then worth $45 an acre; that when appellee’s father’s estate was- settled she received therefrom $2,400, and that appellant at that time bought 120 acres of land towards the purchase of which she gave
To this appellee responded by a verified statement, in further support of her application, in which it is averred that she possessed certain personal property at the time of her marriage with appellant; that she inherited 40 acres of land which she held for four years during which it produced $1,000 after which she sold it for $2,500 on 4 years’ time at interest; that all this money amounting to $3,500 or more, together with $50 in cash which appellee received from her mother, and $50, the value of a cow belonging to appellee which appellant had sold, was used by appellant in the purchase of the 120 acres of land referred to, which was purchased when appellee was sick in bed and appellant took the title in his own name; that this purchase was made about 20 years before and appellant had the possession and profits of all of the land until in 1904, when he deeded appellee 50 acres of it in consideration for the money so received from her, and since then had received the income of the residue of the 120 acres; that appellee used what she
Thus is disclosed the most sordid bickering between two who should long since have learned the lesson of mutual forbearance and should be spending together a placid evening of life in a peaceful common home. Perhaps, if a divorce should be inevitable, conditions are also shown upon which the just hand of a court of equity should be laid in making a proper division of property between the parties. But the question before us is whether, upon the facts disclosed, the allowance can be sustained.
A case might be presented to this court for review where the relative financial condition of the husband and wife was such that an allowance of temporary alimony or suit money to the wife out of the husband’s estate would be an abuse of discretion, and the wife would be compelled to resort to her own estate for her support and expenses even though she would be compelled to sell or incumber part of it to do so. But we cannot say that the facts upon which the trial court acted in this case are of such a character.
The judgment is affirmed.
Note.—Reported in 102 N. E. 32. See, also, under (1) 14 Cyc. 752; (2) 14 Cyc. 743; (4) 14 Cyc. 756; (5) 14 Cyc. 749, 762. As to the power of courts in divorce suits to create and enforce liens for alimony, see 102 Am. St. 700. On the question of husband’s prospects as basis for alimony, see 4 L. R. A. (N. S.) 909.