Court Opinion

ID: 9529138
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:47:57.721089+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:27:41.637106
License: Public Domain

Mallery, J.
(dissenting) — The plaintiff brought an action for separate maintenance in 1953. April 7, 1954, defendants filed an amended cross-complaint for annulment of the marriáge, which had purportedly been entered into in Lincoln, Nebraska, on June 29, 1949. It is not disputed that defendant was then married to another woman. Thé trial-court found the marriage to be void ab initio and granted an annulment. *871It divided the property of the parties, allowed attorney’s fees, gave plaintiff custody of their minor child with visitation privileges to the father, provided fifty dollars a month for child support, and awarded plaintiff one hundred fifty dollars a month alimony for fourteen months.' The alimony provision is the sole subject of this appeal.
There is no statutory provision in this state for an award of alimony in the annulment of a marriage void ab initio. There are no cases in this state supporting the trial court’s authority, under the common law, to make such an award.
The legal liability of one person for the support of another has been predicated from time immemorable upon some legally recognized relationship. In the absence of a marital, contractual, or blood relationship between the parties, there seems little common-law basis for sustaining such a liability. It is for the legislature to say otherwise. This is particularly true because the public policy involved is one solely within the province of the legislature, which has purported to deal comprehensively with the subject of divorce and annulment in all its phases.
I dissent.
Hill and Schwellenbach, JJ., concur with Mallery, J.