Court Opinion

ID: 9701514
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 22:22:34.852254+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:24.281476
License: Public Domain

WICKERSHAM, Judge,
dissenting:
On March 2, 1981 President Judge Oscar F. Spicer filed a memorandum opinion and an order of court deciding that the alleged marriage subsisting between the parties, Judith E. Hertz and Jack F. Hertz after 1973 “is hereby declared to be invalid.” From this apparently final order, Judith E. Hertz took this appeal which the majority now quashes as premature. By so doing, the majority places form over substance.
I would remand the record to the lower court with directions that the procedures set forth in Rule 1517 of the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure be specifically followed.^ Rule 1517 provides as follows:
(a) The court shall make an adjudication and may do so before the testimony has been transcribed. The adjudication shall consist of (1) a statement of the issues; (2) a *263closely condensed chronological statement, in narrative form or in separate findings, of all the facts which are necessary to be known in order to determine the issues; (3) a discussion of the questions of law involved and the court’s conclusions of law and (4) a decree nisi.
(b) The adjudication may be made orally in open court at the end of the trial, and in that event shall be forthwith transcribed and filed in the office of the prothonotary, or it may be made thereafter in writing and filed forthwith. In either event the prothonotary shall notify all parties or their attorneys of the date of filing.
Had the lower court clearly made “an adjudication” consisting of the various parts set forth in Rule 1517 including a decree nisi, then counsel for appellant Judith E. Hertz would have been on notice to and required to file exceptions under Rule 1518, Pa.R.C.P. which provides as follows:
Within ten (10) days after notice of the filing of the adjudication exceptions may be filed by any party to rulings on objections to evidence, to statements or finding of fact, to conclusions of law, to the decree nisi or in cases where requests for findings of fact or conclusions of law have been submitted by leave of court to a failure or refusal to find any matter of fact or substantially as requested. Each exception shall set forth a separate objection precisely and without discussion. Matters not covered by exceptions are deemed waived, unless, prior to final decree, leave is granted to file exceptions raising these matters.
Thereafter a final decree under Rule 1519 would have been entered in due course. This decree would have been entered on the judgment index of the law side of the court pursuant to Rule 1521 of the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure. After entry of judgment the present appeal could have been properly taken.
Since I find that the lower court did not specifically and clearly follow the mandate of Rule 1517, it is in my judgment too harsh to quash the present appeal and leave the appellant in limbo, or worse, out of court entirely.
*264Accordingly, I would remand with directions consistent with this dissenting opinion.