Court Opinion

ID: 9568910
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:08:34.451707+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:14:34.767996
License: Public Domain

Hunstein, Justice,
concurring in part, dissenting in part.
Although I concur fully in the affirmance of the judgment in Case No. S93X0933, I cannot otherwise concur with the majority’s opinion because I cannot agree with the majority that an agreement in which issues such as child custody, child support, and alimony are settled should be treated as a conventional business contract enforceable by an action on a debt in those instances where the parties failed to have the agreement incorporated into their divorce decree. The majority gives no weight to the subject matter of these agreements — indeed, it dismisses as merely serendipitous the fact that the parties to such agreements “happen to be former spouses,” majority opinion at p. 500 — and instead focuses exclusively on whether or not an agreement was incorporated into a final judgment. I, however, cannot disregard the fact that these agreements, by resolving issues arising out of the dissolution of a marriage, involve matters over which we have heretofore required judicial review and supervision. See Conley v. Conley, 259 Ga. 68 (5) (377 SE2d 663) (1989) (trial court presented with agreement to be incorporated into decree not bound by provisions therein for the custody and support of minor children). To hold, as the majority does, that failure to submit an agreement for incorporation into a decree transforms the agreement into a conventional business contract that can be enforced by an action on a debt is to hold that settlement agreements resolving issues critical to the welfare of children and dependent former spouses can validly be executed and enforced without judicial scrutiny of the provisions therein, notwithstanding public policy considerations to the contrary.1 Consistent with my dissent in Carr v. Carr, 263 Ga. 451 (435 SE2d 44) (1993) (even in incorporated agreements parties should not be able to avail themselves of self-executing provisions for child custody because such provisions preclude judicial review necessary to give due consideration to child’s best interest), I must object to this clear and unavoidable consequence of the majority’s holding.
Nothing in the cases cited by the majority supports the conclusion that settlement agreements arising out of a divorce are or should be enforceable in the same manner as conventional business contracts. In Scott v. Mohr, 191 Ga. App. 825 (383 SE2d 190) (1989) the unincorporated settlement agreement addressed solely the issue of payment for the wife’s psychiatric care2 and provided “by its express *507terms [that it] was intended not to be a part of the court’s judgment and decree.” Id. at 826 (1). Based on its finding that the psychiatric-care payment agreement was “freely entered into by both parties, with a potential benefit to each,” the Court of Appeals declined to find that the parties to the agreement violated any rule of law or public policy by taking this agreement out of a domestic relation situation so as to sound only as an action at law for a debt. Id. Larimer v. Larimer, 249 Ga. 500 (292 SE2d 71) (1982), also cited by the majority, is distinguishable in that it involved an action for equitable partition brought because use of the court’s authority to compel compliance with an incorporated settlement agreement would not remedy the conflict between the parties. See also Wallace v. Wallace, 260 Ga. 400 (396 SE2d 208) (1990).
I agree with the holding in Scott v. Mohr, supra, that there is no public policy against allowing parties, when settling certain collateral issues arising out of the dissolution of their marriage, to contract voluntarily to treat these issues as unrelated to the divorce, where the parties expressly so provide. Such agreements would stand on the same basis as conventional business contracts and would not be classified as involving “domestic relations” issues. Id. But such is not the case with the agreement the majority would have Ms. Eickhoff enforce as a conventional business contract. The Eickhoffs executed their agreement to settle “matters relating to [the parties’] respective rights, duties and obligations arising from their marital status, including the matters relating to property division, alimony, custody, visitation, and child support.” Although in this instance Ms. Eickhoff seeks to enforce only a provision regarding her share of Mr. Eickhoff’s pension and Social Security benefits, the majority’s opinion is not limited to such provisions but instead extends to any and all provisions in unincorporated settlement agreements.
Assuming the validity in Georgia of this unincorporated agreement,3 the result of the majority’s decision to include all provisions of unincorporated divorce settlement agreements in the same category as conventional business contracts will be to leave available to plaintiffs such as Ms. Eickhoff only unsatisfactory and inappropriate contract remedies; repeated breaches of these agreements will necessitate the filing of a suit every month to obtain payments provided for in the agreements.4 Further, because the majority holds that these unin*508corporated agreements do not involve domestic relations issues, discretionary applications under OCGA § 5-6-35 (a) (2) to review each monthly judgment will no longer be required, so that the parties will have the right to appeal those judgments directly to the Court of Appeals. Although most conventional contract litigants are unlikely to pursue such a litigious course of action, given the frequency with which some parties refuse to abide by agreements that have been incorporated into divorce decrees, it cannot be denied that the majority’s opinion now provides parties to unincorporated settlement agreements enormous opportunity to inflict the maximum amount of legal harm on each other.
Decided October 25, 1993
Reconsideration denied November 5, 1993.
Rountree & Souther, George M. Rountree, for appellant.
Carl V. Kirsch, for appellee.
Consistent with this Court’s previous position that private settlement agreements involving issues such as child custody and support should be scrutinized by the trial court, Conley, supra, I would recognize that such agreements are an integral aspect of divorce proceedings, whether or not incorporated into a decree, and would accord them the same dignity as their incorporated counterparts. Because of the critical issues resolved by such agreements, I cannot agree with the majority that a technical failure by the parties to have such agreements incorporated into a divorce decree justifies surrendering judicial scrutiny of these agreements and accordingly, I must respectfully dissent.

 See, e.g., OCGA § 19-6-15 (a); Pruitt v. Lindsey, 261 Ga. 540 (1) (407 SE2d 750) (1991).

 The psychiatric-care payment agreement was one of two agreements executed by the divorcing parties: the other agreement was incorporated into the divorce decree.

 Under Pennsylvania law, the majority’s position would be moot pursuant to 23 P.S. § 3105, which provides that “whether or not the [divorce settlement] agreement has been merged or incorporated into the decree” the parties thereto can utilize the remedies and sanctions to enforce the agreement “to the same extent as though the agreement had been an order of the court.”

 Although a parent is statutorily obligated to provide for the maintenance, protection and education of an unemancipated child, OCGA § 19-7-2, to the extent a divorce settlement *508agreement obligates a parent to provide items in excess of the statutory minimum, as in the agreement here requiring Mr. Eickhoff to provide support to an emancipated minor in college, such obligations could likewise be enforced only by periodic lawsuits.