Court Opinion

ID: 9617762
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:00:52.68421+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:04:16.048237
License: Public Domain

Duckworth, Chief Justice,
dissenting. 1. We should understand the meaning of Code § 74-105 at the outset. It provides that until majority it is the duty of the father to provide for the maintenance, protection and education of his child. In Bd. of Ed. of Cartersville v. Purse, 101 Ga. 422 (28 SE 896) at page 433, it is recognized that the father has a duty to educate his child, but it is there pointed out that neither at common law nor by any Georgia statute is provision made to compel the father to do so. If Code § 74-105 imposes an enforceable duty to educate until the age of 21 why enact Ga. L. 1916, p. 101, to compel the father to send his children to school between the ages of 8 and 14; or Ga. L. 1945, p. 343 (Code Ann. *25§ 32-2104) requiring him to send his children from 7 to 16 years of age to school? The plain simple reason is that the legislature knew Code § 74-105 was unenforceable. It should also be noted that despite the apparent unqualified command of Code § 74-105, this court consistently, as in Thompson v. Ga. R. &c. Co., 163 Ga. 598, 604 (136 SE 895), holds, that when the child marries before reaching 21, the duty of the father to support it ceases. While Code § 74-105 says it is the duty of the father to protect his child, I would think no one would seriously say he could be sued if he failed to prevent another from assaulting and injuring the child, although in such cases he has the highest moral duty and lawful right to protect it. In Hooten v. Hooten, 168 Ga. 86 (147 SE 373), at page 89, this court in speaking of the duty under Code § 74-105 to educate, quoted Mr. Justice Cobb in the Purse case, supra, as follows: “While the common law recognized this as a duty of great importance, there was no remedy provided for the child in case this duty was not discharged by the parent. The child at the will of the parent could be allowed to grow up in ignorance and become a more than useless member of society; and for this great wrong brought by the neglect of his parents the common law provided no remedy.” It was there held that Code § 74-105 came from the common law. A further quotation by Justice Cobb was: “The section cited declares that the father shall provide for the maintenance, protection, and education of his child, but relatively to the matter of education no provision is made for the punishment of a parent who fails to discharge this duty, or for the relief of the child who is a victim of such failure.” Was this court wrong? Until today neither this court nor the legislature has so said.
This court in Flynn v. Flynn, 149 Ga. 693 (101 SE 806) reversed an award of $15 per month for education of the child upon the sole ground that no award of support was therein made. That decision did not rule either for or against the award of education because that question was not presented for decision. But it is pat authority that education is not embraced in the words “permanent support” found in Code § 30-207. Indeed it was held in Barlow v. Barlow, 161 Ga. 202 *26(129 SE 860), that Code § 74-105 has no application to proceedings for alimony. We agree with Mell v. Mell, 190 Ga. 508 (1), 509-512 (9 SE2d 756), where is was said that Code § 74-105 was the law placing a duty to support which Code § 30-207 is designed to enforce. But this court should note well the difference in the two sections, in that Code § 74-105 includes education as well as support, yet when it comes to providing means of enforcement in Code § 30-207, the court was empowered only to enforce the support duty and omits entirely the education duty.
This court has the duty to uphold the law but never to enact it. We should assume that the legislature with knowledge of the Purse case, supra, holding there was no means for enforcing the parent’s duty to educate has never attempted to provide means for enforcement and has deliberately refused to supply the courts with such means because they considered it unwise to do so. This assumption is validated by the above Acts prescribing the years when the parent must send his child to school — the maximum age being fixed far short of majority. Further, we should note that if there be conflict between Code § 74-105 declaring the father’s obligation, and the compulsory school attendance law (Ga. L. 1945, p. 343; Code Ann. § 32-2104) as to his duty to see that his children attend school between the ages of 7 and 16, the latest enactment of the legislature is controlling.
I am further confident that we are confined in this case to the powers conferred by Code § 30-207, for the divorce court was vested therein with power to award only “permanent support.” When this was done as in this case, the court’s power was exhausted, and the attempt to require a trust fund for education was wholly beyond the court’s power and is void. Adams v. Adams, 213 Ga. 875 (102 SE2d 566), did not present the legality of the trust fund for education, nor did this court rule on its legality or hold that it was authorized by the verdict. The jury gave the husband a divorce, and the wife appealed from that verdict. Her appeal made no complaint about the trust fund for her son and certainly raised no question of its legality or the sufficiency of the evidence to support it. The *27general grounds of her motion for a new trial raised only the question of the sufficiency of the evidence to authorize the verdict for divorce of her husband. Furthermore, since the trust fund was in her favor she could not attack it other than for insufficiency.
Here, the verdict claiming authority under Code § 30-207 ■directed this father to deposit in trust $60,000 to be expended by a court-appointed trustee to educate the children regardless of age or marriage. The decree limiting this to minority completely ignores the law saying marriage ends the father’s duty to support and educate.
The majority opinion shows what I believe to be a total misconception of the father’s right to be concerned about his child once custody is awarded to the mother. It overlooks the fact that such does not dissolve the parental relation between the child and its father. His consent would be necessary for its adoption. See Glendenning v. McComas, 188 Ga. 345 (3 SE2d 562); McAlhany v. Allen, 195 Ga. 150 (23 SE2d 676). On a change of circumstances affecting the child’s welfare, the father may secure an award of custody. See Headnote 2 of the McAlhany case, supra. Should the mother die, the law automatically invests the father with the right of custody. Baynes v. Cowart, 209 Ga. 376 (72 SE2d 716); Bridgman v. Elders, 213 Ga. 257 (98 SE2d 547). In the light of these principles of law, together with the natural love of a father for his child — no matter who has custody of it — -it can never be correctly said that the father has no right to be concerned as to the kind of education he obtains for his child. Suppose the child is converted to communism while he pays for its attendance at a communist school, and any one of the above contingencies occurs whereby he regains custody, how would he feel, knowing he was forced to buy the education that completely ruined his child as tested by what he would have chosen for it? This inhuman situation can exist only by judgment of a majority of this court. The legislature has wisely refused to thus provide by law a means of destroying families and arraying parent against child, and I regret to see this court usurp legislative powers to write a law that can do so. Perhaps when countless -minors sue their fathers *28throughout this State to compel them to pay the expenses of such children for attending college, thus creating open warfare between parent and child, the majority of this court will thereby see the danger and chaos this decision threatens.
2. Reversible error is also shown in the charge complained of. The complaint is that it was confusing. It told the jury to look to the pleadings for the issues and that they should decide the issues therein. The petition asked for (1) attorney fees, (2) custody of the children, (3) an educational fund for the children, and (4) a division of the husband’s property. The jury had no lawful right to consider any of these under the law. Nevertheless they did consider every one of them pursuant to the charge. The charge elsewhere correctly instructed the jury to consider the husband’s ability to pay and the wife’s and children’s need for support, and based upon that, fix alimony and support for the children. The jury followed this charge and gave the wife $700 and each child $125 per month for support, and gave the wife other benefits. Therefore, it can not be truthfully said the jury was not confused as is contended in the face of the above four specific instances where they decided matters mentioned only in the pleadings but not in the correct charge, all of which actions are illegal. The fact that the judge decided custody and attorney fees, which he alone could do, does not remotely refute the demonstrated fact that the jury was confused into illegal action by the charge. But even the judge could not render legal the illegal portion of the verdict awarding $60,000 for education of the children and dividing the husband’s property by giving the wife one-fourth thereof.
Beyond any question juries are completely without lawful power in a divorce and alimony case to simply slash up and divide the husband’s property per se. The ultimate of their authority in such a case is to consider only his ability and her needs for support in the manner to which she was accustomed. And they can award this amount in money or its equivalent in property. To do this they should fix the amount in dollars, then they may find a value of property and give it instead of money. But courts should not tolerate longer the actions of juries in arbitrarily dividing up a man’s property under the pretense of giving *29support in conformity with the proofs of ability to pay and needs of the wife.
There is not the slightest doubt but that the charge complained of did precisely what the criticism asserts — confused, and I am confident this confusion caused the illegal findings herein pointed out. If justice is our goal we can reach it only by a judgment of reversal.
I am authorized to state that Mr. Justice Frankum concurs in this dissent.