Court Opinion

ID: 9715988
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:22:41.145654+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:40.563213
License: Public Domain

Henderson, J.,
dissenting in part:
On the point of venue, I agree that a suit for specific performance of a contract is a transitory action that will lie wherever the defendant can be reached with process, and that no valid objection to a decree for specific performance can be raised on the ground that the contract is one for support. I also agree that the decree cannot properly include an award of custody of a nonresident child having the domicile of its non-resident mother and not present in the State, the father being also a non-resident. Whether the decree could properly réquire the execution of a will, in its nature ambulatory, is open to doubt. See Pomeroy, Specific Performance (3d ed.), p. 492; 5 Williston, Contracts (Rev. ed.) § 1421; Lorenzo v. Ottaviano, 167 Md. 138. A required change in the beneficiary of a life insurance policy, where the policy permits a subsequent change at the option of the insured, would seem to be open to the same objection. The opinion treats both these questions as not seriously *303pressed. My main point of disagreement is with that part of the decision which holds that funds in a spendthrift trust can be reached to satisfy the obligations, past and future, arising out of a contract for payments in lieu of support.
The bill of complaint relies solely on the contract, and seeks to fasten a lien upon the trust estate, of which the defendant is a beneficiary, to satisfy his contractual obligation. There is no claim for support as such under the pleadings. In the absence of contract, it may be doubted whether a suit in equity for support, unconnected with divorce or custody, would lie even against a resident defendant. Apparently no such redress was available at common law, although at least a moral duty was recognized. Borchert v. Borchert, 185 Md. 586, 590; Burns v. Bines, 189 Md. 157, 162; Rawlings v. Rawlings, 83 So. 146 (Miss.) ; note 33 Harv. L. R. 729. The matter has been dealt with by statute both in England and the United States. 2 Bishop, Marriage, Divorce and Separation, § 1155. None of the Maryland statutes touch the instant case. See Code (1951), Art. 16, secs. 34 and 75. See also Code (1951), Art. 89C, Art. 27, sec. 96, and Art. 12, secs. 8, 9, 12. Art. 72A, sec. 1, declares that a father and mother are jointly and severally charged with support, but does not implement the duty. Nor do any of these statutes indicate a policy of enforcing a duty of support when all of the parties are non-residents. Cf. Restatement, Conflict of Laws, secs. 457 and 458, comment (a) ; Melvin v. Melvin, 129 F. 2d 39, (C.A. D.C.); Kiplinger v. Kiplinger, 2 So. 2d 870.
In State v. James, 203 Md. 113, 121, it was held that a resident defendant was properly charged in Maryland with the crime of non-support, although the child was in another State, but it was stated that jurisdiction under Code (1951), Art. 27, sec. 96(b), was predicated upon the fact that the father was domiciled in Maryland. The Restatement, Conflict of Laws, § 457, was cited to indicate that a State has legislative jurisdiction to impose a penalty on that basis. The opinion in the instant case *304relies upon the Uniform Support of Dependents Act, Code (1951), Art. 89C. (Acts of 1951, Ch. 301). But that Act also seems to be predicated upon the Maryland residence of the obligor, where the obligee is not a resident of or present in the State, for it declares (sec. 7) that the “Duties of support enforceable under this Article are those imposed or imposable under the laws of Maryland upon the alleged obligor during the period for which support is sought.” (Italics supplied.) It may also be observed that the present proceeding is not within the terms of the Statute, for there is no petition from an initiating State, as the Act requires. The opinion also relies upon George v. George, 23 A. 2d 599 (N. J.). That case was based on a New Jersey statute, and dealt with separate maintenance of a wife. It was held that although both parties were non-residents, property of the husband in the State could be reached. Other courts have held to the contrary. See note 74 A. L. R. 1242. So have we. Keerl v. Keerl, 34 Md. 21. There is no comparable statute in Maryland.
I find nothing in Article III, sec. 38, of the Maryland Constitution to enlarge the court’s jurisdiction to award support against a non-resident. That amendment was adopted to confer on a court of competent jurisdiction the same power to punish for contempt for failure to support, as traditionally exercised for failure to pay alimony. Cf. Knabe v. Knabe, 176 Md. 606. It did so by declaring that a decree for support, or approving an agreement for support, should not constitute a debt within the prohibition against imprisonment for debt. The additional remedy for disobedience of the order has no bearing whatever upon jurisdiction to pass the order in the first instance. It is said that a decree approving an agreement for support is equated to a decree for support in the absence of • agreement, and that the agreement in the instant case has now been approved by a court. But the amendment seems to contemplate either a decree that presently and prospectively fixes an amount found necessary for support, or one that *305adopts an amount presently agreed to by the parties, although the court is not bound by such an agreement. Here, there was no finding as to the present needs of the child or the relative resources of the parties, nor could the court find that the parties were in agreement. The decree was simply for specific performance of an agreement made years ago and immediately repudiated, and the award was by way of damages for past breaches and sequestration to insure future performance. There was no claim for reimbursement of expenditures for necessaries by one who had a joint duty to support, nor would such a claim be maintainable in equity. Hull v. Hull, 201 Md. 225, 233.
If any implication is to be drawn from the amendment, beyond its enlargement of the remedy by contempt, it would seem to be that suits for alimony and support should be handled by the same court in the same way. Yet the decision in the instant case sets up a new distinction, based largely upon the argument that an agreement in lieu of alimony is between parties sui juris, while an agreement in lieu of support of a child is not. But, obviously, the agreement in the latter case is between parties who are sui juris, and merely undertakes to fix the liability for support as between persons who are jointly liable. Such an agreement could never be binding upon the Court in passing an award.
Our recent decisions clearly mark the line of distinction between a general moral or legal duty to support a wife or child which may in a proper case be enforced in equity, and a contractual one voluntarily assumed. In Safe Deposit & Trust Co. v. Robertson, 192 Md. 653, we adopted the view of the Restatement, Trusts, § 157, that there is an exception to the well-established rule recognizing the validity of spendthrift trusts, in the case of claims against the beneficiary by his wife or child for support or by the wife for alimony. We rested the exception on grounds of public policy, rather than upon interpretation of the instrument creating the trust, to indicate our disapproval of the cases cited in Scott, *306Trusts, § 157.1, which, base the exception on a presumed intention of the donor. The better view, and the one relied on in most of the cases, is that the public policy, which frustrates the obvious desire of the donor to protect the beneficiary from the consequences of improvident undertakings and liabilities rashly incurred, comes into play only as against obligations imposed by law upon persons occupying the status of husband, parent or citizen and arising out of that status. 6 American Law of Property (1952), § 26.130, p. 585. We pointed out that since an alimony decree is always open to revision, and takes into account the current resources of the parties, there was only a remote danger that the beneficiary might be left destitute. In Hitchens v. Safe Deposit & Trust Co., 193 Md. 62, following Bauernschmidt v. Safe Deposit & Trust Co., 176 Md. 351, we held squarely that the exception did not extend to an obligation to pay permanent alimony based on a contractual undertaking. I think that case is controlling.
The opinion stresses the reasonableness of the contract, in that the weekly payments do not appear to be above what a court, having jurisdiction to award support, might allow. But this is an extraneous circumstance that should not affect the result. Actually, these payments were fixed as a result of a bargain, in which the contemplated property transfers on the one hand, and the waiver of alimony on the other, played a part. Thus, the figure arrived at in lieu of support for. the child, may have been more or less than the court would determine or approve. The court could not decline to enforce the contract, based on an adequate consideration, even if it were grossly improvident and unreasonable. Cf. Lawson v. Mullinix, 104 Md. 156, 168, and note 65 A. L. R. 7, 75.
If the rule now announced is that any contract, for payments in lieu of support for a child, is enforceable against a spendthrift trust, then the protection stressed in the Robertson case is removed. I do not see how the court could sever the contract or limit its applicability *307as against the spendthrift trust to what it might deem a proper allowance without depleting the fund, particularly where there is no finding as to support and no jurisdiction to make one. Obviously, the court could not make a new contract for the parties. Quite apart from the rule of stare decisis, I think the Hitchens case was rightly decided, and the reasoning there applied to alimony applies to support as well. I think that part of the decree that allows recovery against the fund, based solely on specific performance of the contract, should be reversed.