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3 Va. L. Reg. n. s. 241 (1917-1918)
Right of Husband to Chastise Wife

handle is hein.journals/valrgn3 and id is 243 raw text is: Virginia Law Register Vo,. 3, N. S.] AUGUST, 1917. [No. 4 RIGHT OF HUSBAND TO CHASTISE WIFE. UNDER THE ROMAN LAW. Under the early Roman law the marital power of the hus- band was absolute, and he could chastise his wife even to the point of killing her.' Bryce says that this absolute power was confined to very primitive times;2 and another writer on Ro- man law has doubted the power of the, husband to put the wife to death.3 During the later period of the Roman law the hus- band's power over his wife was much curtailed. Blackstone, after speaking of the husband's right of chastisement under the common law, says: The civil law gave the husband the same, or a larger, authority over his wife. 4 UNDER CO*M'MON LAW AND IN GREAT BRITAIN. By the old common law rule the husband had the right to in- flict moderate personal chastisement on his wife,5 provided he used, as some of the old authorities stated it, a switch -no larger than his thumb.6 It is not easily seen how the thumb should have been the standard of size for the instrument which the hus- band might use. A light blow, or many light blows, with a stick. larger than the thumb, might produce no injury; but a switch half -the size might be so used as to produce death. The 1. Sohm Inst., § 93; 21 Cyc. 1143. 2. Bryce Studies Hist. and Jur., 787. 3. Hunter Rom. L. (3d ed.), 224. 4. 1 Blackstone Comm., 444, 445. 5. Bacon's Abr., title Assault and Battery, C., 373; 1 Hawk. P. C. 180; Moor, 874; Rex v'. Lister, 1 Stra. 478, 875; Matter of Cochran, 8 Dow[. P. C. 630, 4 Jur. 534. See also, Mathewson v. Mathewson (Conn.), 63 Atil. 285, 5 L. R. A. (N. S.) 611, 615;.Brown v. Brown (Conn.), 89 Ati. 889; James v. Commonwealth (Pa.), 12 Sergeant and Rawles 220, 226. 6. See State v. Oliver, 70 N. C. 60; State v. Rhodes, 61 N. C. 453.

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