Him and I

[Carol]

bboyminn:
> 
> Well, I vaguely recall that the rule is you say it in the same
manner as you would if you were only referring to one person.
> 
> "It did not matter to him."
> 
> "It did not matter to me."
> 
> Compare that to -
> 
> "It did not matter to he."
> 
> "It did not matter to I."
> 
> Or,
> 
> "He and I went to the store."
> 
> "He went to the store."
> 
> "I went to the store."
> 
> Rather than the obviously wrong but frequently used -
> 
> "Him and me went to the story."
> 
> Seems simple enough.
> 
> Steve/bboyminn
>
Carol responds:

Not exactly a rule, Steve, but certainly a good test of correctness.
In fact, it's one I used to recommend to my students and still
recommend to my editing clients.

Again, we're back to case: subjective (or nominative) case for
subjects and objective case for objects. All that's needed is to
recognize the subject of a sentence or clause and the object of a
preposition (or a direct or indirect object) when you see it and
supply the correct case--and, while we're at it, the verb agrees with
the subject and not the nearest noun.

Carol, noting that the object of a preposition can never be the
subject of a sentence