Title: Ex Parte Bayliss

State: alabama

Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court

Document:

550 So. 2d 986 (1989)
Ex parte Cherry R. BAYLISS.
(Re Cherry R. BAYLISS v. John Martin BAYLISS).
88-616.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
June 9, 1989.
Rehearing Denied July 14, 1989.
*987 Frank M. Bainbridge of Porterfield, Scholl, Bainbridge, Mims & Harper, Birmingham, for petitioner.
Stephen R. Arnold of Durwood & Arnold, Birmingham, for respondent.
HOUSTON, Justice.
We granted certiorari in this case to address the following issue: In Alabama, does a trial court have jurisdiction to require parents to provide post-minority support for college education to children of a marriage that has been terminated by divorce?
The trial court does have that jurisdiction. In a proceeding for dissolution of marriage or a modification of a divorce judgment, a trial court may award sums of money out of the property and income of either or both parents for the post-minority education of a child of that dissolved marriage, when application is made therefor, as in the case at issue, before the child attains the age of majority. In doing so, the trial court shall consider all relevant factors that shall appear reasonable and necessary, including primarily the financial resources of the parents and the child and the child's commitment to, and aptitude for, the requested education. The trial court may consider, also, the standard of living that the child would have enjoyed if the marriage had not been dissolved and the family unit had been preserved and the child's relationship with his parents and responsiveness to parental advice and guidance.
Patrick Bayliss was born of the marriage of Cherry R. Bayliss ("mother") and John Martin Bayliss III ("father"). This marriage was terminated by divorce when Patrick was 12 years old. When Patrick was 18, his mother filed a petition to modify the final judgment of divorce; that petition, as amended, alleged:
The trial court, in its order denying the petition to modify, entered the following findings, which are fully substantiated by the record on appeal in this case:
The trial court then found that Patrick had attained 19 years of age; and, therefore, held that, as a matter of law, the court was without authority to order the father to pay and be responsible for any part of the cost of his son's college education, since Patrick did not come within the definition of the term "children" or "child" or "dependent child" or "dependent children" as those terms are used in the statutes and decisions of the appellate courts of Alabama.
The Court of Civil Appeals affirmed, 550 So. 2d 984 (1989) relying on its case of English v. English, 510 So. 2d 272 (Ala.Civ. App.1987), which clearly held that a parent is under no legal obligation to educate an adult child unless the child is physically or mentally disabled, or an executed agreement is reached, or an oral agreement requiring this is announced in open court. No one petitioned this Court for a writ of certiorari to the Court of Civil Appeals in English, supra. The mother did petition for such a writ in this case; we granted the petition, and we now reverse the judgment of the Court of Civil Appeals on this issue.
Alabama Code 1975, § 30-3-1, provides, in pertinent part:
"Upon granting a divorce, the court may give the custody and education of the children of the marriage to either father or mother, as may seem right and proper...." (Emphasis supplied.)
While jurisdiction over minor children has been claimed by courts of equity, independent of any statute, on the ground that the government is the parens patriae,[1]Hansford v. Hansford, 10 Ala. 561, 563 *989 (1846), any jurisdiction of a trial court to require a parent to provide post-minority support for a child's college education is conferred by statutes, expressly or by implication. The Legislature of Alabama has not enacted a specific statutory change in its domestic relations laws to permit post-minority support for college education. If, in Alabama, the court that rendered the initial decision in the divorce retains a continuing, equitable jurisdiction over the issues and parties so that it can in the initial decision or in a modification thereof, order either or both parents to provide post-minority support for college education for a child of the marriage terminated by that divorce, it must derive such jurisdiction from the absence of restrictive language in Alabama Code 1975, § 30-3-1.
In Ex parte Brewington, 445 So. 2d 294 (Ala.1983), this Court held that the term "children" in § 30-3-1 did not apply only to "minor" children. Mr. Justice Beatty, in overruling cases that had given the word "children" that limited definition, wrote, for a majority of the Court:
445 So. 2d  at 296.
Looking at the word "children," "[i]n the frame of reference of the present case," we note that the pertinent portions of § 30-3-1 have been part of the codified law of Alabama continuously since Alabama Code 1852, § 1977. From 1852 to 1975, the age of majority in Alabama was 21 years.
We have found no early Alabama appellate court cases that even discussed whether a college education was a "necessary" that a divorced parent had to provide a minor child. The earliest case that we have found involving the question of whether a college education is a necessary is Middlebury College v. Chandler, 16 Vt. 683, 42 Am.Dec. 537 (1844). In that case, which involved a suit brought by Middlebury College against the father of a minor college student for the student's tuition and other college expenses, the Vermont Supreme Court refused to hold that a college education was a necessary, for the following reasons:
16 Vt. at 538-39.
Beginning with the landmark case of Esteb v. Esteb, 138 Wash. 174, 244 P. 264 (1926), courts have increasingly recognized a college education as a legal necessary for minor children of divorced parents. Justice Askren wrote:
"`The second duty of the parent is that of education; a duty which Blackstone pronounces to be far the greatest of all in importance. This importance is enhanced by the consideration that the usefulness of each new member of the human family to society depends chiefly upon his character, as developed by the training he receives in early life. Not the increase of population, but the increase of well-ordered, intelligent, and honorable population is to determine the strength of the state; and, as a civil writer observes, the parent who suffers his child to grow up like a mere beast, to lead a life useless to others and shameful to himself, has conferred a very questionable benefit upon bringing him into the world, and the education should be consistent with the station in life of the parties. Solon excused the children of Athens from maintaining their parents if they had neglected to train them up in some art or profession. So intimately is government concerned in the results of early training, that it interferes, and justly, too, both to aid the parent in giving his child a good education, and in compelling that education, where the parent himself, and not the child, is delinquent in improving the opportunities afforded.'
138 Wash.  at 181, 244 P.  at 266-67.
This Court in deciding this issue in Ogle v. Ogle, 275 Ala. 483, 486, 156 So. 2d 345, 348 (1963), wrote:
Patrick was born March 5, 1969. If the age of majority had remained 21 years, as it was from 1852 to 1975, Patrick would have been entitled to have his father contribute toward his college education, at least until March 5, 1991. But in 1975, the age of majority was reduced to 19 years in Alabama, with certain exceptions. Alabama Code 1975, § 26-1-1; for exceptions see § 26-1-1(d) (youthful offenders) and § 28-1-5 (purchase of alcoholic beverages, since May 29, 1985).
Kathleen Conrey Horan, Postminority Support for College EducationA Legally Enforceable Obligation in Divorce Proceedings? 20 Family Law Quarterly (American Bar Association) 589, 604 (1987).
In Davenport v. Davenport, 356 So. 2d 205, 208 (Ala.Civ.App.1978), the Court of Civil Appeals held that "minority is a status rather than a fixed or vested right and... the legislature has full power to fix and change the age of majority." See, Hutchinson v. Till, 212 Ala. 64, 101 So. 676 (1924). In New Jersey St. Pol. Ben. Ass'n v. Town of Morristown, 65 N.J. 160, 320 A.2d 465, 470 (1974), Justice Pashman wrote of the pragmatic age of majority:
The Supreme Court of New Jersey has carved out these same two exceptions to the general rule that the duty to contribute to the support and education ends when a child reaches the age of majority. See, Newburgh v. Arrigo, 88 N.J. 529, 443 A.2d 1031 (1982); see also, Sakovits v. Sakovits, 178 N.J.Super. 623, 429 A.2d 1091 (1981). In Glen A. Smith's exceedingly erudite article, Educational Support Obligations of Noncustodial Parents, 36 Rutgers L.Rev. 588, 613-14 (1984), he wrote:
The parties have presented the Court with excellent briefs and oral arguments.
The appellate courts of Florida have held that the noncustodial, divorced parent of an adult child cannot be required to pay college education expenses, in the absence of a disability or agreement. Grapin v. Grapin, 450 So. 2d 853 (Fla.1984); French v. French, 452 So. 2d 647 (Fla.Dist.Ct.App. 1984); Maas v. Maas, 440 So. 2d 494 (Fla. Dist.Ct.App.1983), rev. den., 451 So. 2d 849 (Fla.1983); Slaton v. Slaton, 428 So. 2d 347 (Fla.Dist.Ct.App.1983); Klein v. Klein, 413 So. 2d 1297 (Fla.Dist.Ct.App.1982). It appears that the Courts in Missouri, Alaska, and possibly Vermont, have also so held. Lieberman v. Lieberman, 517 S.W.2d 478 (Mo.App.1974); H.P.A. v. S.C.A., 704 P.2d 205 (Alaska 1985); West v. West, 131 Vt. 621, 312 A.2d 920 (1973). The father also relies on cases from North Carolina, Colorado, Nebraska, New Mexico, Ohio, New York, and Kentucky; however, it appears that these cases are not applicable to a decision under Alabama law, because of the particular language of the jurisdictional child support statutes of those states. Our own statute reads:
Ala.Code 1975, § 30-3-1.
In the six years since Brewington was announced, the Legislature has not seen fit to modify § 30-3-1 by adding the word "minor" before the word "children." We do not suggest that the failure of the Legislature to act in this area necessarily constitutes its approval of our construction in Brewington of § 30-3-1;[2] however, clearly it knew how to alter the status quo by adding the word "minor" before "children" in § 30-3-1 as it did in § 30-3-4.
In expanding the exception to the general rule (that a divorced, noncustodial parent has no duty to support his child after that child reaches majority) to include the college education exception, we are merely refusing to limit the word "children" to minor children, because of what we perceive to be just and reasonable in 1989. The Latin phrase "stare decisis et not *994 quieta movere" (stare decisis) expresses the legal principle of certainty and predictability; for it is literally translated as "to adhere to precedents, and not to unsettle things which are established." Black's Law Dictionary (5th ed. 1979). By this opinion, we are unsettling things that have been established by the appellate court of this State (the Court of Civil Appeals) that has exclusive appellate jurisdiction of "all appeals in domestic relations cases, including annulment, divorce, adoption and child custody cases." Ala.Code 1975, § 12-3-10. However, we are persuaded that the ground or reason of those prior decisions by the Court of Civil Appeals would not be consented to today by the conscience and the feeling of justice of all those whose obedience is required by the rule on which the ratio decidendi of those prior decisions was logically based.
Therefore, we overrule that portion of the following cases that are inconsistent with this opinion: English v. English, 510 So. 2d 272 (Ala.Civ.App.1987); Bonham v. Bonham, 489 So. 2d 578 (Ala.Civ.App.1985); Cain v. Cain, 452 So. 2d 874 (Ala.Civ.App. 1984); Wier v. Wier, 410 So. 2d 78 (Ala.Civ. App.1982); Holmes v. Holmes, 410 So. 2d 115 (Ala.Civ.App.1982); Ralls v. Ralls, 383 So. 2d 857 (Ala.Civ.App.1980); Godec v. Godec, 346 So. 2d 459 (Ala.Civ.App.1977); Huckaba v. Huckaba, 336 So. 2d 1363 (Ala. Civ.App.1976).
In making this holding, we are not the first by whom this new is tried, for we have cases from other jurisdictions, referred to by Justice Holmes as "the evening dress which the newcomer puts on to make itself presentable according to conventional requirements," Book Notice, 14 Am.L.Rev. 233-34 (1880). We had cases from other jurisdictions that we followed in Ogle v. Ogle, 275 Ala. at 486, 156 So. 2d  at 348.
Had the Bayliss family unit not been put asunder by divorce, would the father, who had attended college and was a man of significant means, have continued to provide a college education for Patrick (a young man who would be an Alpha Plus if this were Huxley's Brave New World) after Patrick reached 19 years of age? If so, the father's educational support obligations should not cease when Patrick reached 19 years of age.
The Legislature has given circuit courts the "power" to divorce persons for certain causes. While the rights of the parties to the divorce action must be fully respected, the public occupies the position of a third party in a divorce action; and the court is bound to act for the public. Flowers v. Flowers, 334 So. 2d 856 (Ala.1976); Hartigan v. Hartigan, 272 Ala. 67, 128 So. 2d 725 (1961); Ex parte Weissinger, 247 Ala. 113, 22 So. 2d 510 (1945).
This Court in Ogle, 275 Ala. at 487, 156 So. 2d  at 349, quoted the following from Pass v. Pass, 238 Miss. 449, 118 So. 2d 769, 773 (1960), with approval:
"`[W]e are living today in an age of keen competition, and if the children of today... are to take their rightful place in a complex order of society and government, and discharge the duties of citizenship as well as meet with success the responsibilities devolving upon them in their relations with their fellow man, the church, the state and nation, it must be recognized that their parents owe them the duty to the extent of their financial capacity to provide for them the training and education which will be of such benefit to them in the discharge of the responsibilities of citizenship. It is a duty which the parent not only owes to his child, but to the state as well, since the stability of our government must depend upon a well-equipped, a well-trained, and well-educated citizenship. We can see no good reason why this duty should not extend to a college education. Our statutes do not prohibit it, but they are rather susceptible of an interpretation to allow it. The fact is that the importance of a college education is being more and more recognized in matters of commerce, society, government, and all human relations, and the college graduate is being more and more preferred over those who are not so fortunate. No parent should subject his worthy child to this disadvantage *995 if he has the financial capacity to avoid it.'"
This is the public policy of our State. Since the normal age for attending college extends beyond the age of 19 years, under § 30-3-1 courts have the right to assure that the children of divorced parents, who are minors at the time of the divorce, are given the same right to a college education before and after they reach the age of 19 years that they probably would have had if their parents had not divorced.
The trial courts of this state that handle the dissolution of marriages have long dealt with hard problems of alimony and child support and the hardest problem of all, child custody. King Solomon is noted for his wisdom, primarily because of his judgment in a child custody case. Our trial courts have demonstrated that they have the wisdom of Solomon in these domestic matters. We know that they will continue to demonstrate that wisdom in deciding whether to require a parent to provide, or help defray the cost of, a college education for a child, even after that child attains the age of 19 years.
The father suggests that to require him to pay for Patrick's college education after Patrick attained the age of 19 years, would deny the father equal protection under the law. We adopt the following reasoning from Smith, Educational Support Obligations of Noncustodial Parents, 36 Rutgers L.Rev. 588, which discusses, in some detail at pages 626-41, the constitutionality of post-minority college support obligations, and concludes with this observation:
36 Rutgers L.Rev. at 641.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
HORNSBY, C.J., and MADDOX, JONES, SHORES and KENNEDY, JJ., concur.
STEAGALL, J., concurs in the result.
ALMON and ADAMS, JJ., dissent.
ALMON, Justice (dissenting).
The writ of certiorari was improvidently granted in this case. Therefore, the writ should be quashed. For that reason, I dissent.
ADAMS, J., concurs.
[1]  "`Parens patriae,' literally `parent of the country,' refers traditionally to role of state as sovereign and guardian of persons under legal disability." Black's Law Dictionary (5th ed. 1979) at 1003.
[2]  Justice Scalia, in his dissent in Johnson v. Transportation Agency, 480 U.S. 616, 671-72, 107 S. Ct. 1442, 1473, 94 L. Ed. 2d 615 (1987), wrote:

"[O]ne must ignore rudimentary principles of political science to draw any conclusions regarding that intent from the failure to enact legislation. The `complicated check on legislation,' The Federalist No. 62, p. 378 (C. Rossiter ed. 1961), erected by our Constitution creates an inertia that makes it impossible to assert with any degree of assurance that congressional failure to act represents (1) approval of the status quo, as opposed to (2) inability to agree upon how to alter the status quo, (3) unawareness of the status quo, (4) indifference to the status quo, or even (5) political cowardice."