Law Commons^™

Conflict Of Spousal Immunity Laws: The Legislature Takes A Hand, Dale A. Whitman

Faculty Publications

During the 1967 session of the North Carolina General Assembly, the legislators made a novel excursion into the realm of conflict of laws, modifying the state's traditional rule of lex loci delicti as it applies to spousal immunity. The purpose of this comment is to explore the legal background and examine the possible effects of the new statute, and to consider its implications for existing choice-of- law doctrine. At common law, neither spouse could bring an action against the other for negligently inflicted injury. Such a rule leads to a good deal of manifest injustice, and it has been abandoned …