Court Opinion

ID: 3599858
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2016-07-05 23:46:34.811317+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:15:36.207640
License: Public Domain

We are all agreed that the contract executed in this case was illegal and against public policy. The wife was given a confession of judgment upon the consideration that she should obtain a divorce from her husband. Having obtained the divorce she has entered judgment upon the confession and is proceeding to collect it through officers of the law. The husband made application to the Supreme Court to set aside the judgment because of the illegal nature of the transaction, but the motion was denied upon the ground that his relief was in equity. He has brought this action to set aside the judgment and to enjoin the execution issued thereon. The defendant is his wife, under her name by remarriage. Relief has been denied the plaintiff upon the principle that he has not come into equity with clean hands, and pleads his own moral turpitude. The question is: in matters dealing with the marital status should this general principle of equity outweigh a sound public policy by treating a confessed judgment as an executed contract.
If the wife had brought suit upon the contract for the money promised, the husband could have defended on the ground of the illegal nature of the consideration. If judgment in such action had been taken by default, *Page 116 
the husband, thereafter, could have moved the court to open the default and permit him to appear and plead the illegal consideration. Such application would not have been denied.
There is little difference between a judgment by confession and a judgment by default. The motion which the husband in this case made to set aside the judgment entered by confession should have been granted at least to the extent of permitting him to come in and defend. The evidence in such an action would have been the same as that given in this case, and the decision would have set aside the judgment absolutely.
The husband, however, has become the plaintiff, for reasons stated, and seeks the same relief which would have been given him had he been a defendant, or had his motion at Special Term been granted and he permitted to defend. Public policy has a stronger claim for action by the court in such a case as this than the "clean hand" equity rule has for non-action.
In Bredin's Appeal (92 Penn. St. 241) a petition was made to open a judgment entered by confession and permit the defendant to set up the illegality of the consideration which was the compounding of a felony. It was there stated:
"There is no difference in legal effect between a judgment confessed, or for want of appearance or plea, and a judgment on the verdict of a jury. The court in which the judgment is rendered will indeed open one of the former kind, and let the defendant into a defence in a proper case and upon equitable terms. * * *
"The entry of judgments, either by attorneys or prothonotaries, on judgment-notes, is very common. These though having the same effect as if on the verdict of a jury, while they stand, in fact, never were the results of adjudication. To hold that such a judgment entered on an immoral and illegal obligation, part of a transaction *Page 117 
subversive of public interests, shall be deemed an executed contract, with absolute right in the plaintiff to judicial process for collection, would be shocking to every man's sense of justice. The argument is that the judgment shall stand, for the plaintiff need only show the note, and the defendant, as actor, will not be heard alleging his own and the plaintiff's turpitude in an application for opening the judgment. * * * The reason of the rule which allows a defendant to plead and prove the illegality of a contract in bar of a suit upon it, demands that he be heard in an application to open a judgment so confessed. His rights are of secondary importance, and he is not heard for their vindication. It is the duty of the court, on proper showing, to open such a judgment, to the end that there may be a trial as if suit had been originally commenced on the note or other obligation on which the judgment was entered."
I am of the opinion, therefore, that the complaint in this action should not have been dismissed, but that the relief prayed for should have been granted. And I go further than some of my associates who would simply enjoin the collection of the money, leaving the judgment to stand as an executed transaction. The judgment should be set aside in toto, and the wife enjoined from proceeding further under the contract.
HISCOCK, Ch. J., CHASE and CUDDEBACK, JJ., concur with McLAUGHLIN, J.; CRANE, J., in opinion votes to reverse judgments and to order judgment vacating judgment in favor of defendant against plaintiff; COLLIN and HOGAN, JJ., vote or affirmance.
Judgments reversed so far as they dismiss complaint and judgment ordered vacating execution issued on judgment in favor of defendant against plaintiff and enjoining further proceedings for enforcement of said judgment, without costs. *Page 118