Coos v. Coos

162 P. 860, 82 Or. 693, 1917 Ore. LEXIS 97
CourtOregon Supreme Court
DecidedFebruary 6, 1917
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 162 P. 860 (Coos v. Coos) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Oregon Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Coos v. Coos, 162 P. 860, 82 Or. 693, 1917 Ore. LEXIS 97 (Or. 1917).

Opinion

Mr. Justice Moore

delivered the opinion of the court.

It appears from the testimony given at the trial that the parties were married March 4, 1909. Prior there[694]*694to the plaintiff had been engaged in a department store, fitting ladies’ ready-made gowns and coats. The defendant then was a logger, and for some time thereafter he continued in that business, his wife residing with him at lumber camps. She testified thajv about three months after her marriage the defendant began growing cross and disagreeable toward her,, which conduct continued until March 29, 1915, when she was obliged to leave him, taking the child with her to the home of a relative. The first year of their marriage the company employing the defendant failed in business, and he lost thereby about one half of the-wages which he had earned. Owing to the sluggish condition of the lumber market on the Pacific Coast in subsequent years the former activity in the timber business was retarded, and the defendant was obliged! to seek employment in other fields of labor in which he took but little interest, and in consequence thereof he worked but a short time at any one place. As the-support of himself and family was derived from his wages, his failure continuously to pursue any occupation necessarily reduced those depending upon him almost to a state of penury. The plaintiff testified that in the six years during which she lived with her husband he purchased for her articles of wearing apparel the prices of which did not exceed $52, and that the-clothing which she possessed at the time of her marriage was, after many turnings of the material, so-much worn that she became destitute, whereupon her sister gave her $25, which sum of money she used in replenishing her wardrobe. In answer to the inquiry as to what statements the defendant made to the plaintiff in reference to her leaving him she testified:

“He told me a number of times, when he would be acting bad, that if he didn’t suit me, I could get up and [695]*695go; that he would he a damned sight better off without me.
“Q. Was this on the one occasion of your going to* leave, or before that?
“A. Before that, a number of times. He once got mad because I owed a little interest, paid some money on a piece of land my brother owned. He wanted me to have my brother make a deed to the place. I objected. He got mad and cross, and cursed around and said lots of things. For three days he wouldn’t come in to eat. Occasionally he would come in between meals and go to the cupboard and get something to* eat. I have come in and asked him if he found anything. He would say: £What in hell does it make any difference to you? You don’t care a damn bit about me. Go pet your brother. ’
££Q. How long would he go that way, without speaking to you?
££A. A week or so. He wouldn’t speak unless I asked him something. Then he would curse, or else not answer when I spoke to him. It was a ,common thing, a frequent occurrence, and sometimes it would be more than a week, as long as three. We lived in one place, it was an old shed, and the door had nothing but a block nailed there for a latch, and he would come and kick on the door, and not ask me to open the door, and if I didn’t get there in time he would kick until he knocked the door loose. That is the way he let himself in, lots of times.
£ £Q. What could you say as to him scolding you during the last three or four years, how he spoke to you, if at all?
“A. Well, he would get cross and scold, and lots of times go on about something I had done, saying why in hell I didn’t have sense enough to do it some other way, and looked like I ought to know enough. Maybe leave me with the chores to do, and I would do them the best I could, and after he came home, I hadn’t done them to suit him, and he would say why in hell didn’t I know enough to do them some other way, and it looked like I would have sense enough to know a few things. * # He would come in to his meals. I [696]*696always tried to have them on time; sometimes he would put the clock back a few minutes, and I wouldn’t know it, and dinner wouldn’t be quite ready, then it would be, ‘Damn it, what in hell have you been doing?’ ”

The plaintiff testified that, though she desired the defendant should not incur any indebtedness, he negotiated for prunes growing in an orchard, agreeing to pay for the fruit when it was harvested, and that he gathered and sold the crop, but did not pay for it. She further stated upon oath that her husband sold a pair of horses that were mortgaged, and was arrested for the offense; that the defendant frequently drank intoxicating liquor, and on one occasion he became so much under the influence of the alcoholic beverage that he vomited on the floor of their dwelling. Mr. Coos habitually used profane and indecent language in the presence and hearing of his wife and daughter until the latter commenced repeating her father’s irreverent expressions. The mother testified on this subject that when the little girl would get in his path he would say to her: “God damn you, get to hell out of my way”; that he would use in their hearing utterances that are set forth in the transcript, but which are too obscene to be repeated in an opinion; that he would tell Margaret he didn’t want her to obey her mother, saying to the latter: “You haven’t got as much sense as the child.” In answer to the court’s inquiry on direct examination as to what the defendant had called her, the plaintiff testified:

“He never applied a curse directly to me until I told bim I was going to leave, and then he said, ‘God da/mri it to hell,’ if I wanted to go, he wouldn’t stop me. He said I was nothing but a ‘ damn low son-of-ab-h.’ He repeated that several times.”

She further testified on this subject:

[697]*697“He never applied Ms enrses direct to me only the one time more than to say, ‘Get yonr damned head 'out of the way,’ or ‘your damned arm out of the , way.’ ”

Another question by the court was:

“Do you think it would be impossible for you and your husband to adjust your differences?”

She replied:

“It certainly would. I tried six years to get along the best I could. It was simply impossible. I stayed on account of the child; I thought, perhaps, he would get better on her account, but he didn’t. I simply saw that if I expected anything from her I had to get away; if it had not been for the bad effect on the baby —no matter for myself — if it hadn’t been it would have ruined the child, I would have stayed.”

In referring to the defendant Mrs. Coos further testified :

“I remember once, he sat around the house most of the day — it was in the winter, I remember. He sat around the house most all day. He wasn’t working. There was nothing but a few cMps around the barn. He didn’t come back from the bam after dinner. There was very little wood for the heater, and nothing at all for the cookstove. The next morning, of course, there was no wood. He wanted to know if there wasn’t any, and I said, ‘No,’ he didn’t get any before he went to bed. He wanted to know, ‘why in hell I didn’t get out and pick up some chips.’ There was absolutely nothing to burn. I had to ask him to cut up some of the sticks to bum in the heater.

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Related

Rothwell v. Rothwell
347 P.2d 63 (Oregon Supreme Court, 1959)
Billion v. Billion
3 P.2d 1113 (Oregon Supreme Court, 1931)

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Bluebook (online)
162 P. 860, 82 Or. 693, 1917 Ore. LEXIS 97, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/coos-v-coos-or-1917.