Johnson v. Johnson

Citations

• 125 Ill. 510
• 16 N.E. 891

Syllabus

<p>1. Husband and wife—separate maintenance—what will justify the wife in living apart from her husband. To maintain a bill by a wife against her husband for separate maintenance, the former must show, not only that she had good cause for living separate and apart from her husband, but also that such living apart was without fault on her part.</p> <p>2. The fault on the wife’s part contemplated by the statute, is a voluntary consenting by her to a separation, or such failure of duty or misconduct on her part as materially contributed to a disruption of the marital relation.</p> <p>3. If the wife leaves her husband voluntarily or by consent, or if her misconduct has materially induced the action on the part of the husband upon which she relies as justifying the separation, she will not be without fault on her part, within the meaning of the law.</p> <p>4. While it is not the policy of the law to encourage a husband and wife in living apart, yet a wife who is not herself in fault, is not bound to live and cohabit with her husband if his conduct is such as to directly endanger her life, person or health, nor when he has pursued a persistent, unjustifiable and wrongful course of conduct toward her, which will necessarily render her life miserable, and living as his wife unendurable.</p> <p>5. Mere incompatibility of disposition, occasional ebullitions of passion, trivial difficulties or slight moral obliquities, will not justify the wife in separating from her husband and claiming a separate maintenance.</p> <p>6. If the husband voluntarily does that which compels the wife to leave him, or justifies her in so doing, it may be inferred that he intended to produce that result, and the wife’s leaving, in such ease, would be desertion on his part, and not on the part of the wife.</p> <p>7. Same—offer on the part of the husband to resume the marital relation. If the husband, after he has forced his wife to leave him, by harshness and cruelty, offers to take her back, support