Court Opinion

ID: 9635843
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 14:07:53.544658+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:37.542733
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Flood, J.:
The “well-nigh absolute” duty of a father to support his five-year old child is enforceable at the instance of the mother, and the mother cannot bargain away her child’s right or encumber it with conditions. But this is a very different thing from saying that the mother can enforce a contract for the child’s support (in an amount which might be greater, or for that matter less, than a court would order) when she herself has first breached other provisions of that contract.
The case of Foley v. Foley, 63 Pa. Superior Ct. 69 (1916) relied upon by the majority, involved an agreement for custody made at the same time that a decree was entered determining the parties’ property rights, and the court merely held that the breach of this agreement, which related to a subject “only incidental to the decree”, was no defense to the enforcement of the decree.
No court order for support can be avoided by failure of the mother to allow visitation rights to the father. The cases cited by the majority go no further. They are not authority for enforcing a contract which has already been breached by the plaintiff.
The mother’s right to obtain a court order for support for her child in this case seems clear and she can recover reasonable amounts which she has expended for the child’s support in quantum meruit. But she *39is not entitled to recover on the contract which she herself has broken.
Agreements for support, subject always to modification or even nullification by the court, if the children’s rights are sacrificed, are to be encouraged. They will not be encouraged if their enforcement is to be completely one-sided.