Opinion ID: 3133564
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Constructive Service by Publication

Text: Constructive service by publication of a small notice in the classified section of a local newspaper has been an accepted method of substituted service for well over a century. See, e.g., Pennoyer v. Neff, 95 U.S. 714, 727 (1877). However, sixty-five years ago, the United States Supreme Court clarified that constructive service by publication is permissible only if it is accomplished in a manner reasonably calculated to give a party defendant adequate notice of the pending judicial proceedings. Mullane v. Cent. Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U.S. 306, 314 (1950). In Mullane, the Supreme Court observed that ―[m]any controversies have raged about the cryptic and abstract words of the Due Process Clause but there can be no doubt that at a minimum they require that deprivation of life, liberty or property by adjudication be preceded by notice and opportunity for hearing appropriate to the nature of the case.‖ Id. at 313. The Supreme Court noted that personal service is the classic form of notice and is ―always adequate in any type of proceeding.‖ Id. at 313. But the Supreme Court stopped short of mandating personal service in all circumstances, explaining that ―[a] construction of the Due Process Clause which would place impossible or impractical obstacles in the way could not be justified.‖ Id. at 313-14. Nevertheless, the Supreme -15- Court reiterated that ―when notice is a person‘s due, process which is a mere gesture is not due process.‖ Id. at 315. The Supreme Court highlighted some of the problems with publication notice: It would be idle to pretend that publication alone . . . is a reliable means of acquainting interested parties of the fact that their rights are before the courts. It is not an accident that the greater number of cases reaching this Court on the question of adequacy of notice have been concerned with actions founded on process constructively served through local newspapers. Chance alone brings to the attention of even a local resident an advertisement in small type inserted in the back pages of a newspaper, and if he makes his home outside the area of the newspaper‘s normal circulation the odds that the information will never reach him are large indeed . . . . In weighing its sufficiency on the basis of equivalence with actual notice, we are unable to regard this as more than a feint. Id. For missing or unknown persons, the Supreme Court explained that service by this ―indirect and even . . . probably futile‖ means—publication—does not raise Due Process concerns. Id. at 317. But as to known parties with known addresses, the Supreme Court concluded that notice by publication is constitutionally defective because it is not ―reasonably calculated, under all the circumstances, to apprise interested parties of the pendency of the action and afford them an opportunity to present their objections.‖ Id. at 314. The Court revisited Mullane thirty-three years later in Mennonite Board of Missions v. Adams, 462 U.S. 791 (1983). There, a landowner signed a mortgage in favor of the Mennonite Board of Missions. Id. at 792. After the landowner failed to pay property taxes, the county began proceedings to sell the property. Id. at 794. Indiana law required posting notice at the county courthouse and publishing notice for three consecutive weeks but allowed the county to sell the property thereafter to the highest bidder. Id. at 793. After the auction, a two-year redemption period commenced, during which anyone with an interest in the property could pay the delinquency. Id. Failing that, the purchaser acquired the deed. Id. at 794. The county published notice and auctioned the property. Id. Adams, as the high bidder, sued to quiet title to the property. Id. at 794-95. Mennonite Board of Missions did not learn of the tax sale until after the redemption period had expired and argued that publication notice of the tax sale was constitutionally inadequate. Id. The Indiana courts rejected this argument, but the Supreme Court held that ―unless the mortgagee is not reasonably identifiable, constructive notice alone does not satisfy the mandate of Mullane.‖ Id. at 798 (emphasis added). The Supreme Court observed that Mennonite Board of Missions‘ identity was known, and it assumed that its address could have been ascertained by reasonably diligent efforts. Id. at 798 n.4. The Supreme Court held that ―[n]otice by mail or other means as certain to ensure actual notice is a minimum constitutional precondition to a proceeding -16- which will adversely affect the liberty or property interests of any party, whether unlettered or well versed in commercial practice, if its name and address are reasonably ascertainable.‖ Id. at 800. The Supreme Court held that publication notice failed to provide Mennonite Board of Missions with due process. Id. From these decisions, a common theme emerges: constructive service by publication should be viewed as a last resort means of serving a party whose identity is known. See Walker v. City of Hutchinson, 352 U.S. 112, 117 (1956) (―In too many instances notice by publication is no notice at all.‖); City of New York v. New York, New Haven & Hartford R.R. Co., 344 U.S. 293, 296 (1953) (―Notice by publication is a poor and sometimes a hopeless substitute for actual service of notice. Its justification is difficult at best.‖); In re Adoption of M.D.W., Jr., No. M2007-01689-COA-R3-PT, 2008 WL 820561, at  (Tenn. Ct. App. Mar. 26, 2008) (―Constructive service is the last resort and is only permitted when the defendant‘s residence is unknown.‖); 1 Restatement (Second) of Judgments § 2, reporter‘s note cmt. a (1982) (―Some courts still do not seem to have appreciated the thrust of Mullane. The critical distinction is between notice to known claimants and notice to persons unknown. Notice by publication meets the requirement of adequate notice as to the latter but not as to the former.‖ (internal citations omitted)). 2. Statutory Requirements for Constructive Service by Publication Tennessee statutes permitting constructive service by publication incorporate safeguards to ensure that the foregoing constitutional principles are satisfied. See Garland v. Seaboard Coastline R.R., 658 S.W.2d 528, 530 (Tenn. 1983) (recognizing that the provisions of Rule 4 of the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure were designed to ensure that process is served in a manner reasonably calculated to provide a defendant with adequate notice of pending judicial proceedings); Freeman v. City of Kingsport, 926 S.W.2d 247, 250 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1996) (holding that the ―diligent inquiry‖ language of Tennessee Code Annotated section 21-1-203 essentially codifies the constitutional due process standard that ―actual notice is required if the interested party‘s name and address are reasonably ascertainable‖). Therefore, because service of process is not ―a mere perfunctory act‖ but has ―constitutional dimensions,‖ a plaintiff who resorts to constructive service by publication must comply meticulously with the governing statutes. In re Z.J.S., No. M2002-02235-COA-R3-JV, 2003 WL 21266854, at  (Tenn. Ct. App. June 3, 2003) (citing In re Baby Girl B, 618 A.2d 1, 17 (Conn. 1992)). Father failed to comply with the governing statutes. Service of process in termination of parental rights cases in chancery and circuit courts is accomplished pursuant to the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure and state statutes. Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 36-1-113(e), -117(m)(1). With respect to constructive service, the Tennessee Rules of Civil Procedure generally defer to the statutes. See Tenn. R. Civ. P. 4.08 (―In cases where constructive service of process is permissible under the -17- statutes of this state, such service shall be made in the manner prescribed by those statutes, unless otherwise expressly provided in these rules.‖). Several statutes address the topic of constructive service by publication. First, Tennessee Code Annotated section 21-1-203(a) authorizes dispensing with personal service of process in various circumstances, including, ―[w]hen the residence of the defendant is unknown and cannot be ascertained upon diligent inquiry.‖ Tenn. Code Ann. § 21-1-203(a)(5). To dispense with personal service of process in any of the instances described in subsection (a), however, subsection (b) requires that the facts ―be stated under oath in the bill, or by separate affidavit, or appear by the return.‖ Id. § 21-1-203(b). Another statute, which applies specifically to parental termination proceedings, provides that, when a plaintiff seeks to dispense with personal service of process, the plaintiff must move ―for an order of publication‖ and states that the plaintiff‘s motion ―shall be accompanied by an affidavit of the petitioners or their legal counsel attesting, in detail, to all efforts to determine the identity and whereabouts of the parties against whom substituted service is sought.‖ Id. § 36-1-117(m)(3) (emphasis added).15 Thus, consistent with Mullane and Mennonite Board of Missions, Tennessee statutes authorize dispensing with personal service of process in a proceeding to terminate parental rights only if: (1)―the defendant‘s residence is unknown and cannot be ascertained upon diligent inquiry,‖ Tenn. Code Ann. § 21-1-203(a)(5); and (2) the plaintiff has asked for an order authorizing constructive service by publication and has supported the request with an affidavit ―attesting, in detail, to all efforts to determine the identity and whereabouts of the parties against whom substituted service is sought.‖ Tenn. Code Ann. § 36-1-117(m)(3). Only when the residence of the defendant cannot be obtained through diligent inquiry may a party resort to constructive service by publication. The statute permitting constructive service by publication in parental termination proceedings specifically ―places the burden of demonstrating diligent inquiry upon the petitioners by requiring a detailed affidavit from the petitioners or their legal counsel attesting to all efforts made to determine the whereabouts of the unserved party.‖ In re Adoption of F.M.B.P.W., No. M2007-01691-COA-R3-PT, 2008 WL 821670, at . (Tenn. Ct. App. Mar. 26, 2008); see also Tenn. Code Ann. § 36-1-117(m)(3) (describing the required affidavit). In determining whether the default judgment terminating Mother‘s parental rights is void for lack of personal jurisdiction, we have limited our consideration to the face of the default judgment itself and the record of the proceedings from which the judgment emanated. The record contains neither a motion from Father requesting an order authorizing constructive service by publication nor an affidavit describing the diligent inquiries that were made to locate Mother‘s whereabouts or her residence. The sole 15 The current text of Tennessee Code Annotated section 36-1-117(m)(3) is identical to the statutory text in place when Father filed his petition and relied upon constructive service by publication. -18- affidavit in the record, filed by counsel for Father in support of Father‘s motion for default judgment, states only that, ―[a]fter a failure to obtain service on [Mother] because she had moved with no [ ] forwarding address, service on [her] was obtained by publication.‖ This affidavit is facially insufficient to satisfy the statutory requirement. Not only was this affidavit submitted after Father had resorted to constructive service by publication, it provided no detailed description of any diligent inquiries or efforts that were made to locate Mother or her residence. Furthermore, the record contains no order from the trial court authorizing constructive service by publication. The only document in the record bearing any resemblance to such an order is the ―Non-Resident Notice,‖ which was signed by the Clerk and Master. But even this document fails to describe any diligent inquiries or efforts that were made to locate Mother, and this document lacks any reference to a separate affidavit providing this information. Indeed, the ―Non-Resident Notice‖ purported to authorize constructive service by publication based upon the allegations of Father‘s petition alone. The record of the proceedings in which Mother‘s parental rights were terminated thus demonstrates that Father failed to submit the statutorily required affidavit detailing his diligent efforts to locate Mother‘s whereabouts or residence. Father‘s evident failure to comply with the statutory requirements necessary for dispensing with personal service and resorting to constructive service by publication deprived the trial court of personal jurisdiction over Mother. Therefore, as the trial court and Court of Appeals determined, the judgment terminating Mother‘s parental rights is void. Having determined that the record of the termination proceedings demonstrates that the default judgment terminating Mother‘s parental rights is void, we need not address Father‘s argument that the evidence offered at the hearing on Mother‘s petition to set aside the default judgment preponderates against the trial court‘s finding that Father failed to exercise diligent efforts to locate Mother. We reiterate that, when determining whether a judgment is void, a court must confine its review to the record of the proceeding from which the judgment emanated. If additional evidence is required to establish a defect, then the challenged judgment is voidable, not void. Hood, 432 S.W.3d at 825. Had Father provided the statutorily required affidavit detailing his diligent efforts to locate Mother‘s residence, Mother would not have been permitted to attack the validity of the judgment via Rule 60.02(3) by offering evidence in addition to that in the record to impeach the averments of the affidavit. By the same token, Father cannot now, in response to Mother‘s Rule 60.02(3) motion, validate the void judgment by supplying evidence of diligent efforts that he failed to provide in the statutorily required affidavit before resorting to constructive service by publication. The trial court thus had no obligation to engage in a post hoc determination of whether Father satisfied the diligent efforts standard. -19- Nevertheless, even if Father could validate the constructive service by publication by offering after-the-fact evidence of diligent efforts, we conclude that the record fully supports the trial court‘s finding that Father failed to establish diligent efforts. Father admitted that his efforts to locate Mother consisted solely of: (1) attempting to serve Mother at the marital home address while knowing that he owned the home and that Mother had not resided there since May 24, 1999, when the couple separated; and (2) consulting with counsel. Father made no attempt to serve Mother at the address her own lawyer had used when sending notice of the hearing on his motion to withdraw from representing Mother, even though that address appeared in the record of the divorce proceeding. We need not in this appeal undertake an exhaustive analysis of the measures that must be taken to satisfy the diligent efforts standard. Wilson v. Blount Cnty., 207 S.W.3d 741, 747 (Tenn. 2006) (discussing diligence in the context of personal service of process). Suffice it to say that the diligent efforts standard requires more than attempting to serve a defendant with process at a location where the plaintiff knows the defendant will not be found. ―[A]ctions taken to achieve service of process in these [termination] cases should not be merely perfunctory.‖ Adoption Place, Inc. v. Doe, 273 S.W.3d 142, 148 (Tenn. Ct. App. Dec. 5, 2007) (citing In re C.L.M., No. M2004-02922-COA-R3-PT, 2006 WL 842917, at  (Tenn. Ct. App. Mar. 30, 2006)). We also reject Father‘s argument that any failure on his part to exercise diligence should be excused because he had no knowledge or information that would have enabled him to locate Mother or her address; thus, any attempt to locate her would have been futile. We have no way of knowing now whether Father would have been successful in locating Mother had he diligently attempted to do so at the time he filed his petition to terminate her parental rights. In the face of statutory and constitutional requirements and Father‘s own admission that he made no effort at all to locate Mother before resorting to constructive service by publication, we cannot excuse his blatant noncompliance. We reiterate that Tennessee Code Annotated sections 21-1-203(a) and 36-1-117(m)(3), consistent with constitutional due process principles, require that diligent efforts be made and prescribe the circumstances and procedures that must be followed before a plaintiff may resort to constructive service by publication in termination of parental rights actions. The record reflects clearly that Father failed to abide by these statutory procedures. Therefore, constructive service by publication was ineffective, and the judgment terminating Mother‘s parental rights is void for lack of personal jurisdiction.