NO MORAL CLAIM.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 104, 4 May 1929, Page 12

NO MORAL CLAIM.

RICH WIDOW'S HUSBAND.

ATTEMPT TO UPSET WIIX.

DISMISSED BY JUDGE

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

HAMILTON, Friday,

Mr. Justice Blair gave judgment today in a case in which Alfred Jones, billiard saloon proprietor, Hamilton, applied in the. Supreme Court at Hamilton to be made a beneficiary under his late wife's will:' His Honor dismissed the application, holding that no right to an oi'dei had been established. "It is certainly not common for a man to marry a rich woman, in New Zealand, and expect her to keep him in idleness, said his Hon6r. "Such cases have occurred,'but they are-rare, and a man content to accept this, unenviable position loses caste among his fellows. Although before the Married Women's Property Acts a husband became entitled to the whole of his wife's estate when he honoured her by taking her in marriage, this doctrine has received such severe handling both by legislation and trend of modern ideas that it is doubtful if marriage by a poor man to a rich woman now gives him any moral claims on her purse. A man with any pride in manhood would scorn to advance such a claim." Large Sums Advanced. His Honor said the applicant married Catherine Mildred Cummings in October, 1020, she their being a spinster, aged h3. Applicant was himself a widower with seven children. His wife, when he married her,, .was a woman of considerable means. ' The/vvh.oip.byrdcn of supporting him and bringing, up the younger members of his family plaintiff left to his wife, and this is suggested as explaining the diminution in the value of her estate, lie apparently spent the bulk of his time in following horse racing or in playing jbowls. Plaintiff procured from his wife [advances of very large sums of money which were put into property in his name. The position was becoming so unsatisfactory that testator's brothers or sisters, several of whom had materi-j ally helped her to amass her small for-'

tunc, deemed it proper to intervene, and pressure was brought to bear upon plaintiff, Avhich ultimately resulted in the placing of his wife's advances on a proper footing. Deceased divided her estate equally between her four brothers and three sisters, and this meant that each of them would benefit to tlie extent of approximately £1000. Except in the case of one brother, it might be said that the rest of the family were financially no better off than the plaintiff. Encouraged in Idleness. The judge said it appeared to him plaintiff was driven to maintain that his wife was indulgent to him in his lifetime, and that, having so indulged him it was her duty to do so after her death. This was 110 doubt relevant to the question of the existence of moral cluty. This element was absent, and there was no evidence that the wife encouraged her husband in idleness. "The husband is able-bodied, and if he likes he can work, and has years of work before him," concluded the judge. "As the result of assistance from the wife he has some means, and he should be able materially to increase his income, if he will trouble to do so. I do not see that he has any moral claim on his wife, who has discharged family burdens that lie himself should have discharged. The application is dismissed, with £10 10/ costs and disbursements."