Court Opinion

ID: 9646507
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 13:01:26.99016+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:38.703189
License: Public Domain

Marian F. Penix, Judge, dissenting. I agree with the majority opinion that the wife’s allegation of adultery against the husband was not such an indignity against the husband as to constitute a ground for divorce. He admitted adultery. I must, however, dissent to the majority’s rationale and interpretation of the caselaw of Arkansas. The majority holds the chancellor properly could consider the husband’s adultery as a basis for his decree in favor of the wife. Arkansas long has been in the forefront of those states encouraging — and even making compulsory — the inclusion in one lawsuit of all matters which might conveniently be brought in by amendment, even if they occurred long after commencement of the action. Troxler v. Spencer et al, 224 Ark. 132, 270 S.W.2d 936 (1954). However, I do not believe the law to be that voluntary sexual intercourse between a married person and someone other than his or her lawful spouse* if committed for the first time after a separation brought about by other causes, is actionable adultery in a divorce suit. This adultery should only be admitted as evidence if it somehow validly is connected with the causes for the estrangement. In Buck v. Buck, 207 Ark. 1067, 184 S.W. 2d 68 (1944), and Spurlock v. Spurlock and related causes cited in the majority opinion, as well as an annotation in 98 A.L.R.2d 1264, it is clear that Arkansas and most other courts adhere to the rule that a divorce will not be granted for causes arising after the action was commenced. In this case Dr. Milne, the husband, left home in October, and filed his complaint for divorce a week later, and within the time for pleading the wife filed her answer and original counterclaim. Thus, this action was “commenced” long before the husband’s adultery two months later in January. The majority opinion suggests that the Spurlock case, requiring that adultery must have occurred before the commencement of the action, was based on a misconstruction of the statute, which now is Ark. Stat. Ann. §34-1208 (Repl. 1962) which says the ground must have existed within five years “next before the commencement of this suit”. The majority reasons this is but a statute of limitation. If anything, I believe the courts have used §34-1208 to extend time for the occurrence of grounds for divorce on to the time of commencing the action instead of the time of separation. Our divorce courts should concern themselves with the behavior of the parties up to the time they separate. These are the facts which possibly will show the fault in the break-up of the marriage. What happens beyond the separation is irrelevant except for the limited purpose of corroborating evidence of occurrences prior to the separation. Spurlock v. Spurlock, supra. Adultery was never a common law crime. Once it was punishable in the ecclesiastical courts of ancient England. Some of the American states have passed statutes making adultery a crime, but as far as I can determine Arkansas has never had such a statute. Cook v. State, 102 Ark. 367, 144 S.W. 227 (1912). Dr. Milne’s sexual conduct after his separation, if unrelated to the causes of the separation, was a matter between him, his conscience, and possibly his God, but not between him and the Chancery Court of Pulaski County which has, in effect, required celibacy of Dr. Milne from separation until divorce from the bonds of matrimony, if ever. This case should be reversed and remanded to the Chancery Court with the instructions that the added allegations of adultery should not have been considered as evidence unless casually connected to events prior to the separation.   The Random House Dictionary of the English Language, 1976.