Case 4. Property Rights of Married People

Martha accuses herself in confession of stealing her husband’s money, and, when the confessor asks about the circumstances, she answered that her husband earns by his labor the sum of twenty shillings every week, but gives her only ten to pay the expenses of the family, which scarcely suffice, if indeed they suffice at all, for that, while he dissipates the other ten in drinking with bad companions; furthermore, that she has been accustomed secretly to take three or four shillings from her husband’s clothes, and that on this account her conscience is tormented all the more because she possesses nearly one hundred pounds sterling of her own money, which, however, she says she wishes to preserve for providing dowries for her daughters. Hence it is asked:

1. By our law does a husband acquire any right in the goods of his wife?

2. Is support owed by a husband to his wife and children from strict justice?

3. What is to be said of the case?

1. Does a husband, by English law, acquire any rights in the property of his wife?

No, not by the simple fact of marriage and during the wife's life. He may acquire rights in virtue of marriage settlements voluntarily entered into; and in case the wife dies intestate the husband is entitled to hold, for his life, all the lands and tenements of which he and she were seised in deed in her right, for an estate of inheritance, and after taking out administration he becomes entitled to her chattels, personal as well as real.¹

1 Manual of Moral Theology, vol. i, p. 355.

2. Is the husband bound to support his wife and children in justice, strictly so called?

Yes; this duty is laid upon him by the natural law, and by the law of the land, and when he marries his wife he undertakes to fulfil all his obligations towards her, and thus he is bound in justice by his contract to support her and her children, as well as by the Fourth Commandment.²

2 The same work, p. 288.

3. The case. There is no reason why Martha's conscience should be disturbed at what she does. If she can not otherwise get what is necessary to support herself and her children, she has a perfect right to take it as she does, unknown to her husband. Nor need she be disturbed about her £100. She may keep it intact so that she may be able to give a small dowry to her daughters on their marriage, as long as the husband's wages are sufficient to support her and the family. She is not bound to spend her little hoard in order that her husband may have more to spend in drink.