obligation to make the entrance or stairs safe for plaintiff's use.

This motion was sustained generally, and from that ruling and from the judgment entered upon the directed verdict the plaintiff appeals.

I. In argument to this court counsel on both sides give principal attention to the third or last proposition above mentioned, relating to the duty, if any, resting upon a landlord to provide or maintain a reasonably safe entrance to leased premises.

It seems to be conceded by appellant that, where the landlord leases the entire premises to a tenant, without any promise or covenant to repair or keep in repair, the tenant takes the premises as he finds them and assumes the risk of their safety.

It is insisted, however, this rule does not extend to entrances, stairways, platforms, corridors, and the like, in which the tenant is granted no more than the right to use in common with the landlord, or with other tenants of the landlord, and that in such case the latter is chargeable with negligence if he fails to exercise reasonable care to keep the common passages in proper condition, and he is liable to the tenant for injury so occasioned to him.

The appellee does not seriously question the correctness of this position, but denies that plaintiff has made a case for an application of the conceded principle, because, say counsel, the plaintiff at the time of his injury was the only tenant in any of the rooms served by this stairway, and he is therefore not within the rule which charges the landlord with any responsibility for the condition of a stairway or entrance used in common.

Giving to the plaintiff, as we are required to

Appealdirected verdict

of evidence.

upon

this record, the -construction benefit of the most favorable construction of which the testimony is reasonably susceptible, the jury could have found that plaintiff was not the lessee of all the rooms served by this stairway or entrance; that one or

more of the rooms were occupied by other tenants of the defendant, when plaintiff took possession of his room, and, although vacant at the time of the accident, they were nevertheless under the control of the defendant himself, with full power and authority to let them to other tenants without the consent of the plaintiff. As a witness in his own behalf, the defendant describes the premises let to the plaintiff as follows: "I told him I had those rooms upstairs there, and I wasn't going to rent and would have no use for until I rebuilt those steps and fixed the rooms up, and I told him he could have one of them if he wanted it."

Plaintiff denies that defendant said anything to him about the front stairs being unsafe, but says: "The room he let me have is the second room from the west end on the second floor."

There is also, as already stated, evidence from which it could be found that some of the other rooms were occupied by other tenants when plaintiff moved in, though these tenants had vacated the premises before the accident. If these things be true, and their truth was for the jury to pass upon, the plaintiff was never leased or given exclusive possession of more than one of the rooms having their entrance and exit over the common platform. The fact that the other rooms had become vacant does

tenant-common

of absence of

not, in our judg- Landlord and ment, operate to stairway-effect discharge the de- tenants. fendant from his obligation to look after the safety of the stairs upon which he himself and all of his tenants in that part of the bulding depended, in common with plaintiff, for the beneficial use of the premises. The reciprocal duties and obligations of the landlord and tenant with reference to ways or passages enjoyed in common are to be tested by their contract, and do not fluctuate or disappear and reappear according as the other rooms or apartments to which the common passages are appurte

nant may or may not be filled with tenants.

The general subject of the liability of the landlord for the condition of entrances and hallways in buildings leased by him has been considered by this court on several occasions. Burner v. Higman & S. Co. 127 Iowa, 588, 103 N. W. 802; Morse v. Houghton, 158 Iowa, 282, 136 N. W. 675. See also Watkins v. Goodall, 138 Mass. 533; Looney v. McLean, 129 Mass. 33, 37 Am. Rep. 295; Starr v. Sperry, 184 Iowa, 540, 167 N. W. 531; Peil v. Reinhart, 127 N. Y. 381, 12 L.R.A. 843, 27 N. E. 1077; Siggins v. McGill, 72 N. J. L. 263, 3 L.R.A. (N.S.) 316, 111 Am. St. Rep. 666, 62 Atl. 411, 19 Am. Neg. Rep. 385; 18 Am. & Eng. Enc. Law, 2d ed. 220; 24 Cyc. 1116-all holding to the rule as contended for by the appellant.

The law as laid down by these authorities has the general approval of the courts. With the rule thus settled, the question left in the case is one of fact on which there appears to be a conflict of evidence, the determination of which is for the jury.

There was no such state of facts developed on the trial as would justify the court in holding the plaintiff chargeable with assumption of risk as a matter of law. The defendant testifies that he notified plaintiff of the unsafe condition of

the stairs, and that plaintiff knew their condition to be such that he could not safely use them, but this the plaintiff denies. If a jury should accept plaintiff's story in this respect, there was no assumption of risk. The same may be said upon the question of contributory negligence. Even if plaintiff did know that the stairs were

-use of unsafe

old and dilapidated, passage-effect. or that the other stairway afforded a safer passage, it does not follow conclusively that he was negligent in using the front stairs; for if, as a reasonably prudent person, he had the right to believe and did believe that he could make the ascent in safety by exer cising proper care, then a finding by the jury that he was not negligent should be upheld. Kendall v. Albia, 73 Iowa, 241, 34 N. W. 833; Nichols v. Laurens, 96 Iowa, 388, 65 N. W. 335; Norris v. Cudahy Packing Co. 124 Iowa, 751, 100 N. W. 853, 17 Am. Neg. Rep. 48.

It follows, we think, that the peremptory direction of a verdict for defendant is not sustainable upon any of the grounds assigned for it, and the judgment appealed from manded for a new trial. must be reversed, and cause re

Ladd, Gaynor, and Stevens, JJ.,

concur.

In connection with the subject under consideration, it is to be remembered that by the great weight of authority the landlord is generally absolved from liability for personal injuries to the tenant, due to defects in the leased premises over which the landlord surrenders control at the time of the letting. 16 R. C. L. p. 555. On the other hand, where the landlord leases premises which are occupied by different tenants, and he reserves control over the entrances, stairways,

halls, etc., for the common use of the different tenants, the law imposes on him the duty of exercising reasonable care to keep this portion of the premises in repair, and he is liable for personal injuries to the tenant or the tenant's privies, due to defects in the premises ascribable to the negligence of the landlord in keeping them in repair. 16 R. C. L. p. 557. The reported case (DILLEHAY V. MINOR, ante, 106) raises the question as to which of these rules is to apply where the en

husband who has married again, and thus becomes the head of a family, avail himself of the exemption provided by Code, § 4011, against an execution issued upon a general judgment for alimony rendered in favor of his first wife? Counsel for appellant take the negative of the proposition, and in support of their position have filed a very well-prepared brief, marshaling the authorities on which they rely, and discussing very lucidly the principles which they believe to be applicable to the undisputed facts in this record. That some of the precedents cited do appear to hold substantially as counsel claim is to be admitted, but that they should be accepted by us as controlling authority we are not ready to concede. Taking the country over, there are perhaps no two states in which the exemption statutes are so nearly identical that the construction and effect given to one in one jurisdiction may be said to be satisfactory precedent for the construction and effect of another in another jurisdiction. Again, there is no uniform policy of the courts in general with respect to these laws. In some they are construed and applied with great liberality in favor of the debtor and his family, while in others the tendency is to the opposite extreme, and the debtor gets little which is not assured to him by the strict and technical letter of the statute. Exemptions being strictly creatures of the statute, the question when the right exists, and the scope of such right, resolves itself, in final analysis, into one of construction of the legislative language, and in such matters the courts of each state ordinarily adhere to their own views of the expressed legislative intent. Our exemption statute (Code, § 4008) first provides that, "if the debtor is a resident of this state and the head of a family, he may hold exempt from execution" certain specified items of personal property, varying to some extent as it shall

appear that the debtor is a farmer, mechanic, lawyer, or teamster, etc. Code sections 4009 and 4010 exempt pension money and homes bought with pension money. Section 4011

of the Code is as follows: "The earnings of a debtor, who is a resident of the state and the head of a family, for his personal services, or those of his family, at any time within ninety days next preceding the levy, are exempt from liability for debt."

In the case before us the divorce had effect to restore the husband and wife to the status of unmarried persons, with full and unrestricted right to each to marry again the same as if their marriage relation had never existed. So long as he retained that status defendant's wages were, of course, subject to garnishment, because he was not one of the protected class, for while he was a resident of the state, he was not the head of a family. But when he married, as he legally might, a woman having the legal right to take him as her husband, and established their home in the county, he became literally and undisputably the head of a family and a resident of the state, and emption his right to the exof his wageswages is too clear judgment for alimony. for argument, un

Exemption

less he is to be excluded therefrom upon the theory advanced by counsel and to which we shall now give attention.

The point so made is that the language of the statute is that "the earnings of a debtor who is a resident of the state and the head of a family, for his personal services,

are exempt from liability for debt," and it is argued that this does not include exemption from liability for payment of a judgment for alimony, because an allowance of alimony is not in a legal sense a "debt." Cases are cited which do draw a distinction between a claim for alimony and debt, but very few will be found holding that a claim for alimony which has been reduced