A privy examination, or "separate examination", was a United States legal practice in which a married woman who wished to sell her property had to be separately examined by a
judge
A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility an ...
or
justice of the peace
A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer of a lower or ''puisne'' court, elected or appointed by means of a commission ( letters patent) to keep the peace. In past centuries the term commissioner of the peace was often used with the sa ...
outside of the presence of her husband and asked if her husband was pressuring her into signing the document. This practice, which emerged from English
common law
In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipresen ...
, was seen as a means to protect married women's property from overbearing husbands.
A number of U.S. states continued to require privy examinations into the late 20th century.
References
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Further reading
* Stacy Braukman and Michael Ross, "Married Women's Property and Male Coercion: United States Courts and the Role of the Privy Examination, 1860-1883," ''Journal of Women's History'', 12 (Summer 2000): 57-80. For an online version of this article see
* For information on the role of the privy exam in the 18th century see: Mary Lynn Salmon, ''Women and the Law of Property in Early America'' (Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 1989
History of women's rights in the United States
Property law in the United States