## Facts

- Juanita Boone (Wife) and Freddie Boone (Husband) were married and domiciled in South Carolina.
- Wife was injured as a passenger in an automobile accident in Georgia while Husband was driving.
- Wife filed a South Carolina tort action against Husband for personal injuries.
- The trial court applied Georgia law as the place of injury under South Carolina’s lex loci delicti rule.
- Because Georgia law recognized interspousal immunity for personal-injury actions, the trial court dismissed Wife’s claim.
- Wife appealed, arguing that enforcing Georgia’s interspousal-immunity rule in South Carolina violated South Carolina public policy.

## Issues

1. Whether South Carolina’s public-policy exception to lex loci delicti permits refusal to apply Georgia’s interspousal-immunity doctrine to bar a tort action between South Carolina spouses for an injury occurring in Georgia.
2. Whether interspousal immunity from personal-injury actions is contrary to South Carolina public policy and “good morals or natural justice.”

## Decision

- The South Carolina Supreme Court reversed the dismissal and remanded.
- The court held Georgia’s interspousal-immunity doctrine, as applied to bar the claim in a South Carolina forum, conflicted with South Carolina public policy.
- The court declined to enforce Georgia’s immunity rule despite lex loci delicti, allowing Wife to proceed with her personal-injury action against Husband in South Carolina.

## Legal Principles

- South Carolina generally applies the law of the place of injury (lex loci delicti) in tort cases.
- A foreign law will not be applied in South Carolina when it is against the state’s good morals or natural justice (public-policy exception).
- Interspousal immunity based on marital “unity” is an outdated legal fiction inconsistent with modern recognition that spouses have separate legal identities and legal remedies.
- General concerns about collusion or fraud in interspousal suits do not justify categorically barring claims; ordinary litigation safeguards address fraudulent conduct.
- Preserving “marital harmony” does not require immunity where denying recovery can impose financial hardship from injury, and liability insurance commonly bears the loss.

## Conclusion

South Carolina applied its public-policy exception to refuse enforcement of Georgia’s interspousal-immunity doctrine, holding that South Carolina spouses are not barred from suing each other in South Carolina for personal injuries suffered in an out-of-state accident.


Boone v. Boone, 546 S.E.2d 191 (S.C. 2001)