Raleigh, May 12—Mrs. Ida McManus, 33, is suing her 76-year-old husband, A.W. McManus, for divorce and alimony because he put her up in an old house in the country when she wanted a new bungalow in the city and provided her with a Ford coupe when she wanted a high-priced sedan, lost out today before the supreme court, which could find no cause of action in her complaint. In Mecklenburg superior court the young woman, who lived a total of 20 days with the husband she married in August 1924, won an order for $50 the month alimony pending the trial of her divorce action. But the high court today reversed that order and remanded the case for the trial of a cross bill filed by McManus, who is a Confederate veteran and a grandfather.
Her Complaint
In her complaint, Mrs. McManus alleged that she had been led into matrimony under the promise of her husband to provide her with a home in Charlotte, to buy her a $2,300 automobile and to pay her debts.
What he did, according to the evidence, was to take her to his farm home in Union county and give her the use of a Ford coupe. She lived with him there 10 days and then left. Six months later she returned to him and for 10 days more they lived together in a house in Charlotte to which Mrs. McManus objected on the grounds that they had only one room, the others being let to roomers. “The law will not encourage marriages based on purely mercenary consideration,” Associate Justice declared in the court’s opinion, taking cognizance of the circumstance of the marriage, “the failure of a husband to comply with promises made to his wife with respect to property or property rights, although the wife was induced by such promises to marry him, or to return after she had voluntarily left him subsequent to the marriage, can not be held to justify the wife in leaving her husband or if she does leave him to entitle her to relief.
“The plaintiff alleges specifically,” the opinion read, “that she left the defendant first on September 6, 1924, after having lived with him for ten days at his house in Union county; secondly on April 11, 1925, after she had returned to his home and lived with him again for 10 days at his home in the City of Charlotte.
“She does not allege that the defendant separated himself from her and failed to provide her with necessary substance, according to his means and condition in life, or that he was guilty of any misconduct toward her. No facts are alleged which justify or excuse her in leaving the defendant.
“She alleges only that he failed, neglected and refused to buy a home for her in Charlotte, to pay her debts and to purchase her an automobile costing not less than $2,300, and that she left him because of such failure, neglect and refusal. It is true that she alleges that she married him, and after leaving him in September 1924, returned to him on April 11, 1925 because of his promise to buy the house, pay her debts and purchase the automobile first before the marriage and again before her return to him.
His Denial
“He denies these allegations. If, however, the facts are as she alleges in her complaint they are not sufficient to entitle her to invoke, in her behalf the well settled principle that if a husband, by his misconduct or wrongful acts toward his wife, compels or justified her in leaving his home, this, by law, constitutes an abandonment of her by hi and will entitle her to maintain an actin against him for divorce from bed and board.”
From page 10 of the Messenger and Intelligencer, Wadesboro, N.C., May 20, 1926
newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn97064505/1926-05-20/ed-1/
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