MARRIED WOMEN'S PROPERTY (SCOT LAND) BILL.—(No. 75.) (Hansard, 27 May 1881)

THE LORD CHANCELLOR ,

in moving that the Bill be now read a second time, said, that it had passed the House of Commons, having been introduced there by a Representative of one of the largest of the Scotch constituencies, and having received the assent of the majority of the other Scotch Representatives. Two Acts had been passed in Scotland on this subject—one in 1861, and the other in 1877. The Act of 1861 provided that, in the case of a wife being deserted by her husband, or in case of a separation by decree of a Court, she could obtain a protection order from the Court or Judge, which would have the effect of giving her control over her own property, and removing it from that of her husband; and there was a further clause in that Act which said that if after marriage the wife should acquire any property, the husband might be compelled to make proper provision out of it for her benefit. The Act of 1877 extended those provisions. By it the husband's right was entirely excluded in all cases of the earnings the wife might make by any separate employment, or literary, scientific, or artistic exertions; and the husband was exempted from liability for his wife's ante-nuptial contracts. That was all that had as yet been done in Scotland with a view to diminishing the powers of the husband over the property of the wife. In England a good deal more had 1439 been done, for in the year 1870 an Act was passed to enable wives, whether married before or after the passing of the Act, to secure to themselves against the husband all earnings in trade or business, literary, scientific, or artistic exertions, and all stock of more than £25 in the public funds or Joint Stock Companies; and with regard to women married after the passing of the Act, it secured to them all real estate which they might own, after the passing of the Act, up to the value of £200. The present Bill was introduced in order to carry out the same process of enlarging the wives' legal rights, and, of course, diminishing those of the husband. In Scotland the question which arose in the minds of the framers, with reference to the English Act, was, whether those provisions, large in their character and special in their particulars, might not be better dealt with in a wider or simpler form. The present Bill provided that, in regard to those women who might be married after the Act passed, all the personal and real estate which they had at the time of the marriage, or might afterwards acquire, unless there was a contract to the contrary, should remain and be the separate property of the wife. With regard to those who were already married, there were provisions the effect of which he would state. The 3rd clause of the Bill said the Act should not apply to those already married, with this exception—that property coming to them after the Bill passed would also be subject to the provisions of the Bill; a provision which, no doubt, was wider in its scope than the corresponding provisions of the English Act. The 4th clause provided that married persons might, it they thought fit, by mutual consent, and by a certain procedure, which should be registered, place themselves under the Act. He would not trouble their Lordships with the 5th clause further than to say that, in case of desertion, the Court might dispense with the husband's consent to any deed relating to her estate. The 6th clause was a provision which was introduced in some of our Colonies, especially Canada, and which, as regarded its principle, appeared to be neither unjust nor unreasonable—namely, that in regard to married persons domiciled in Scotland, in the case of the intestacy of the wife, the husband should take a similar interest in the wife's estate which the 1440 wife would take in the husband's. There was also a provision in the Bill that if the personal estate of the wife should be lent or intrusted to the husband who became bankrupt, it should be treated as assets of the husband's estate in bankruptcy, under reservation of the wife's claim to a dividend as a creditor for the value of such money or other estates. He proposed, in Committee, to amend this, by postponing the wife's claim to dividend until all the husband's creditors for money or money's worth had been paid. As to Clause 7, relating to the liability of the husband to the wife's estate for the maintenance of the family, he proposed to move the omission of that clause in Committee, and trust to the good sense and good feeling of the husband and wife. He had now said all that was necessary, and would ask their Lordships to read the Bill a second time.