Court Opinion

ID: 9661786
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 22:49:38.592555+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:33.503364
License: Public Domain

MORGAN, Judge.
I concur in the result reached in the principal opinion but not for the reasons stated therein.
First, I believe relief should be denied in the instant case as a matter of “public policy,” which has been defined as: “. that principle of law which holds that no one can lawfully do that which tends to be injurious to the public or against the public good; it is synonymous with the ‘policy of the law’ and ‘the public good.’ [Citations]” Brawner v. Brawner, Mo., 327 S.W.2d 808, 812[5]. Such principle is indeed applicable to the facts now presented. For instance, most all of the ever increasing number of divorce cases are resolved by court decrees wherein consideration is given to property settlements, alimony and child support based on the financial status of the parties; and, to allow the action now in question, would tend to shatter the bases of all such divorce decrees and open the door to a vindictive rehash of marital difficulties presumably settled by such decrees.
Second, I cannot conceive of any necessity or advantage to litigants or the courts, which resolve their conflicts, in returning to the rigidity of the concept of “unity of the spouses.” A review of the decisions cited in the principal opinion reflects the considered thought given the problem through the years by this court, and to me they appear to have met the needs of a modern day society within the legal principles therein announced.