Court Opinion

ID: 9649091
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:41:58.773573+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:07.659215
License: Public Domain

Robert L. Brown, Justice, concurring. I agree with the result reached by the majority. I do not see, however, the need to rely on the September 10, 1985 garnishment to protect the obligation to pay under the 1985 judgment. My reason for this is that Ark. Code Ann. § 9-14-235 (Repl. 1991), as enacted by Act 507 of 1989, makes it clear that the ten-year statute of limitations for revivor of judgments was done away with for purposes of judgments for child-support arrearages as early as 1989, and not in 1995, as the majority concludes. Act 507 of 1989 supports this conclusion in clear terms: (a) All persons under a court order to pay child support shall continue to pay an amount equal to the child support amount after all children entitled to support reach majority, are emancipated, die, or when the obligor’s current duty to pay child support otherwise ceases if a judgment or child support arrearage exists until such time as the judgment or arrearage has been satisfied. Ark. Code Ann. § 9-14-235(a) (Repl. 1991). The repealer clause in Act 507, which repealed all inconsistent laws, underscored the point that a limitations period on the obligation to pay no longer existed. Because the limitations period for an obligation to pay was repealed by Act 507 within ten years of the September 1985 child-support judgment at issue, whether that judgment was revived for another ten years is irrelevant. Moreover, Act 1184 of 1995 made it clear that the continuing obligation to pay could be enforced by court actions even where collection mechanisms had not previously been put in place. See Ark. Code Ann. § 9—14-235 (i") (Repl. 1998) (removing the prohibition on enforcement by court action). As remedial legislation, Act 1184 can be applied retroactively to the arrearage judgment at issue. See Forrest City Machine Works v. Aderhold, 273 Ark. 33, 616 S.W.2d 720 (1981); Harrison v. Matthews, 235 Ark. 915, 312 S.W.2d 704 (1962); see also City of Fayetteville v. Bibb, 30 Ark. App. 31, 781 S.W.2d 493 (1989). Hence, my principal point of departure from the majority opinion is that I conclude the ten-year statute of limitation on the obligation to pay for child-support judgments was repealed in 1989 as opposed to 1995. That six-year time differential can have considerable consequences for a party enforcing a child-support judgment who is subject to a limitations defense during that period. For this reason, I concur.