McCullough v. Ford

Citations

• 96 Ill. 439
• 1880 Ill. LEXIS 56

Syllabus

<p>1. Married women—the husband reducing wife’s property to possession. The mere fact that notes given for the purchase money of land belonging to a married woman, as her separate property, were taken in the name of her husband, the notes never having been collected by him, will not be regarded as a reduction of the wife’s property to the possession of the husband, so that, by the common law, the title would vest in him.</p> <p>2. Trust—:whether it arises. A married woman, holding lands as her separate property, sold the same, and notes for a part of the purchase money were taken by her husband, in his own name, but were not collected in his lifetime. Under the law of the domicil of the parties—the State of Louisiana— the notes, notwithstanding they were taken in the name of the husband, remained the absolute property of the wife. After the death'of the husband, the widow collected the amount of t-he notes in her own name. Subsequently she married again—this time in the State of Missouri, where the common law prevailed, under which the personal property of the wife became the property of the husband on the marriage. This second marriage was followed by a divorce, and a settlement between the parties, in respect to their property. Upon bill filed by the children by the first marriage against the second and divorced husband, alleging that he held moneys, and property purchased with money which was derived from the estate of their grandfather—their mother’s father—and that a trust arose in their favor, in respect to such property, it was held, that although the mother of complainants did inherit the lands mentioned, from her father’s estate, yet the proceeds of the sales of those lands were her separate property up to the time of her second marriage, never having belonged to her first husband, the complainant’s father, and on her settlement with the second and divorced husband, she had the right to permit him to retain that money if she chose so to do. So no trust aros