Court Opinion

ID: 9626848
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:25:26.912824+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:34.520673
License: Public Domain

Hill, Justice,
dissenting.
Courts normally do not deny judicial relief to sinners. If that were the rule, the case load in all courts would be drastically reduced. Courts normally do not deny judicial relief where both plaintiff and defendant have been immoral. If that were the rule, the divorce rate would be reduced.
What courts invariably do is refuse to enforce a contract where, as the majority says, the contract is "founded upon” an illegal or immoral consideration; i.e., where the consideration for the contract is the agreement by one or both parties to perform an illegal or immoral act. Thus, where a man and woman have contracted with each other to cohabit together illegally, a court will not require the woman to perform her promise nor will it require the man to pay for her services. However, where a man hires a maid to clean house for him, his obligation to pay wages is enforceable in court even though he seduces her. The difference is that in the former case the illegal conduct is part of the consideration for the contract whereas in the' latter case the illegal conduct is not part of the consideration but is incidental to the contract. I do not find evidence that the female in this case agreed to make house payments in consideration of the male’s promise to seduce her or to cohabit with her illegally.
In the case before us, the movant has not carried the burden on a movant for summary judgment of showing that sex was any part of the consideration of this alleged contract. This court has simply presumed that sex was agreed to. We will not guess at the terms of contracts in other cases but here we knowingly imagine what the terms of this agreement were. In my opinion we should not use conjecture to imagine what the parties agreed to do.
Let the defendant state under oath what he says was agreed to and what he says was done and if the contract be illegal let the district attorney represent the state. This court should not deny relief to the plaintiff based on our inference as to what constituted the consideration for the *545alleged agreement sued on here. I therefore dissent.
I am authorized to state that Justice Hall joins in this dissent.