Court Opinion

ID: 9682640
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 08:15:06.304411+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:40.561454
License: Public Domain

SOMERVILLE, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. My principal concern is with the confusion which is sure to arise in the wake of the majority opinion.
*930In arriving at its decision the majority opinion rejected application of the doctrine of abatement. Instead, it chose to affirm the decree of legal separation and division of marital property (with exceptions noted). The net effect of doing so constitutes a final adjudication that the marriage was irretrievably broken prior to the husband’s death and confirms the wife’s share of the marital property. At the same time it leaves the status of the spouses as husband and wife intact as of the date of the husband’s death. Absent going further, the majority opinion preserves all marital rights of the wife in the deceased husband’s estate (including his divisional share of marital property).
The impact of the majority opinion is haunted with the specter of unjust enrichment and gross inequity, for which neither application of the doctrine of abatement nor the result reached by the majority opinion constitutes an antidote. For example, if the doctrine of abatement is applied and the marital property was exclusively held as tenants by the entirety, a surviving spouse succeeds to the entire marital estate notwithstanding the fact the marriage was irretrievably broken. On the other hand, under the disposition made by the majority opinion a surviving spouse is unjustly enriched by simultaneous retention of his or her divisional share of marital property and preservation of his or her marital rights in a deceased spouse’s estate. The patent examples mentioned barely scratch the surface of corresponding injustices and inequities that may be envisioned, virtually ad infinitum, if the law irrevocably commits itself to either the doctrine of abatement or the result pronounced by the majority opinion.
As prescribed in § 452.305, RSMo 1978, grounds for legal separation and grounds for dissolution of marriage are identical, “there remains no reasonable likelihood that the marriage can be preserved and therefore the marriage is irretrievably broken”. Section 452.330, RSMo 1978 (Supp. 1982), mandates setting apart to each spouse his or her separate property and the division of marital property in both legal separation and dissolution of marriage.
Although separate maintenance is still recognized in this state, § 452.130, RSMo 1978, it is legally distinguishable from legal separation. Separate maintenance provides only for support of a wife and children, whereas, legal separation fixes custody of children, maintenance and support for wife and children, and mandates setting apart to each spouse his or her separate property and a division of marital property. Sections 452.330, 452.335 and 452.340, RSMo 1978. There is no escape from the fact that the ramifications of legal separation are vastly more far reaching than separate maintenance, as property rights of the respective spouses are adjudicated in legal separation.
Cases holding that a decree of separate maintenance does not destroy a wife’s marital rights in a deceased husband’s estate, Bingham v. Bingham, 325 Mo. 596, 29 S.W.2d 99, 102 (1930), and Knese v. Knese, 217 S.W.2d 394, 400 (Mo.App.1949), obviously rest upon the premise that property rights of the respective spouses were never adjudicated. As previously demonstrated, the same is not true with respect to legal separation where the property rights of the respective spouses have been adjudicated.
Cognizance is taken that § 452.360(3), RSMo 1978, provides that on motion of either party no earlier than ninety days after entry of a decree of legal separation, the court may convert a decree of legal separation into a decree of dissolution of marriage. As judicially construed, discretion possessed by trial courts under § 452.360(3), RSMo 1978, is tightly circumscribed and conversion, save for “rare cases” (the opinion by footnote implies the possibility of religious grounds for opposing conversion), should not be denied where there. is no evidence that reconciliation is possible. Howard v. Howard, 583 S.W.2d 553, 556 (Mo.App.1979). It is clear that preservation of marital rights in a deceased spouse’s estate is not a consideration as property rights of the respective spouses have already been adjudicated in the decree of legal separation. .
The parties to this litigation, as well as the public, bench and bar, are entitled to *931definitive guidance on the rampant problems inescapably flowing from the death of one spouse after a decree of legal separation has become final absent appeal, or where death occurs pending an appeal from a decree of legal separation which is subsequently affirmed. It is difficult to perceive how one can conscientiously subscribe to the belief that property rights in the aftermath, both in this case and future cases, should be decided on an ad hoc basis by balancing variant equities or inequities peculiar to each. The role of the lawyer in advising clients is made even more difficult when such uncertainty is perpetuated.
The parties to this litigation, as well as the public, bench and bar, would all be better served by going a step further in this case and holding that when one spouse dies after a decree of legal separation has become final absent an appeal, and before conversion, or where death occurs pending an appeal from a decree of legal separation which is subsequently affirmed, death, by operation of law, converts the decree of legal separation into a decree of dissolution with all of its attendant legal ramifications. Without meaning to be flippant or callous, death has no equal for irretrievably breaking a marriage and precluding reconciliation.
SHANGLER and MANFORD, JJ., concur.