Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/843

807 I JURISDICTION TO ANNUL A MARRIAGE 807 a divorce decree and one of nullity are certainly di£ferent. It is true that after a divorce decree the parties become strangers in the eyes of the law. Each may sue the other as though no marriage had existed;^ the relationship by afl&nity is terminated;^ the parties are no longer disqualified from testifying in a suit in which the other is concerned on the ground of interest;^ the wife may be a competent witness in a criminal case against the former husband as to matters arising after the divorce.^ But there is real significance in the statement that the relation is destroyed "as if by death." ^ It once had a lawful existence, of which the legal consequences continue even though the relation itself has terminated. Offspring bom or conceived during the wedlock are legitimate; ^ personal choses of the wife, already reduced to possession by the husband remain his.® Communications between the parties made during the time of wedlock come within the rule excluding the admission in evidence of confidential communications between the husband and wife.-^° An annulment cuts deeper. The woman, after such a decree, can sue a seducer notwithstanding a form of marriage between them, which if valid would have defeated the action.^^ Communica- tions made between the parties after the marriage and prior to the decree are not treated as confidential communications between husl^and and wife, and there is no prohibition upon their admissi- bihty in evidence.-^^ The husband acquires no rights in the wife's property .^^ The woman may maintain an action against the man for the wrongful cohabitation." She is not entitled to the home- stead exemption given a divorced wife.^^ Unless a statute protects them, the children of the parties are illegitimate.^® The divorce de- ' Carlton v. Carlton, 72 Me. 115 (1881). 6 State V. JoUy, 3 Dev. & B. (N. C.) no (1838). » Long V. State, 86 Ala. 36, 5 So. 443 (1888). » 9 R. C. L. 486. 8 Wait V. Wait, 4 N. Y. 95 (1850). ' Lawson v. Shotwell, 27 Miss. 630 (1854). lo Griffeth V. Griffeth, 162 lU. 368, 44 N. E. 820 (1896). " Henneger v. Lomas, 145 Ind. 287, 44 N. E. 462 (1896). • ^ Wells V. Fletcher, 5 Car. & P. 12 (183 1). " Aughtie V. Aughtie, i Phillimore Ecc. 201 (1810). " Blossom V. Barrett, 37 N. Y. 434 (1868). ^5 Floyd County v. Wolfe, 138 Iowa, 749, 117 N. W. 32 (1907). " I Bishop, Marriage, Divorce and Separation, § 277; 2 Ihid. § 1602. See 3 Cornell L. Quart. 51, for collection of New York cases under the provisions of the
 * Kelly V. Neely, 12 Ark. 657 (1852).