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The Green Bag

of thim stairs, they run up; but stand at the top of thim an' they run down, soni" A UNIQUE LEGAL BOND RATHER unique bond, by which John P. Montgomery of Phillipsburg, Missouri, agreed to forfeit the sum of $500.00 to his prospective wife, Martha A. McFall, if, after marriage, he failed to treat her "as a good hus band should," has been brought up for the second time in two years before the Springfield (Mo.) Court of Appeals. A lawsuit won in the Circuit Court of Laclede county, by Mrs. Montgomery against her husband and his bondsmen, has been submitted to the Appellate Court, and will be decided, in all prob ability, at the April call. The bond on which the action is based was once before held legal by the same court. "Public policy" is the main point about which the case revolves. The courts hold that public policy is contravened when a man enters into a contract whereby marriage is held in contempt and its dissolution facili tated; but, on the other hand, it is strictly in keeping with public policy when a man signs a contract whereby marriage is favored, and the marital relation maintained. The Montgomery contract is in the latter class. John P. Montgomery, the defendant in this case, asked for the hand in mar riage of Miss Martha A. McFall, the nineteen-year-old daughter of a neigh boring farmer, in November, 1907. The girl's parents objected, but Montgomery was so insistent, that the court says: "It is obvious to the most casual ob server that there was some strong in ducement." Montgomery finally overcame the objections of the elder McFall's in a way that is substantially without parallel

in any court. With P. M. Montgomery, his brother, and Mrs. Margaret E. Montgomery, his mother, he entered into a contract worded as follows: "Know all men by these presents: That I, John P. Montgomery, having agreed to and married Martha A. Mc Fall, bind myself, and also the following securities, to wit: P. M. Montgomery and Margaret E. Montgomery, in the sum of five hundred dollars — $500 — to the effect that I will treat her, Martha A. McFall, in a good and proper man ner as a husband should treat his wife, and will not maltreat nor abuse her in any manner, and if I should fail to treat her as above stated, then this obligation shall become due and pay able upon myself and bondsmen, pro vided that the said Martha A. McFall shall conduct herself in a proper manner in every respect as the wife of the said John P. Montgomery. "(Seal) John P. Montgomery, P. M. Montgomery, Margaret E. Montgomery. "Done this 15th day of November, 1907." Following the consummation of these strange nuptials, there was born to the couple a child, who is now being sup ported by its mother, it is alleged, at the home of her parents. Soon after the marriage the husband and father deserted his new home, and Mrs. Montgomery immediately took steps to see that her husband forfeited the amount of the bond under which her parents had permitted the marriage to take place. A lawsuit was prepared and filed. The suit came to a sudden and abrupt termination, however, when Judge L. B. Woodside, of the Laclede County Circuit Court, sustained a de murrer filed by the defendant. This ruling was made on the grounds that "The obligation sued upon is against public policy, and is void in that it in