Court Opinion

ID: 9690684
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 19:33:39.462871+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:02:25.181759
License: Public Domain

*86ON MOTION TO STRIKE A PORTION OP THE RECORD
McG-ehee, C. J.
The appellant in this canse has filed a motion to strike from the record on this appeal Pages 1 to 61 thereof inclusive, on the ground that they relate to former proceedings between the same parties involving a divorce, custody of children and the allowance of alimony to the wife, and for the support of two of the children of the marriage, the custody of whom was awarded to the wife, whereas the present proceeding involves “a petition to reopen the cause and allow partition” of their residence property, where they had formerly resided.
Rule 2 of the Revised Rules of this Court is invoked as the ground for the motion to strike from the record the pages thereof hereinbefore referred to. That rule provides: “A transcript shall not contain any part of the case except the pleadings, evidence, instructions, bills of exceptions and the order, judgment or decree appealed from * * *”.
The appellant cites in further support of his motion Sections 1284, 1291 and 1644, Code of 1942, and the following decisions of this Court: Roberts, et al. v. Lyon Co., 124 Miss. 345, 86 So. 851; Barlow v. Serio, 129 Miss. 432, 91 So. 573; Bridgeman v. Bridgeman, 192 Miss. 800, 6 So. 2d 608; Hudson v. Belzoni Equipment Co., 211 Miss. 178, 51 So. 2d 223.
But in this same numbered cause, between the same parties, a decree of divorce was rendered on December 6, 1949, wherein two of the four children were awarded to their mother, the appellee here, and the other two awarded to the father, the appellant here, and the mother was granted a divorce. It appears that on September 23, 1949, the parties had entered into a separation agreement in writing and wherein it was stipulated that the father was to pay the sum of $100 per month beginning October *871,1949, for the support of the mother and the sum of $25 per month for each child kept and maintained by her in the home located on the land involved in the present suit for partition. However, the divorce and custody decree of December 6, 1949, makes no reference to this written contract or to any agreement for the payment of alimony by the father.
Thereafter, on October 30, 1.954, there was a petition filed by the mother to modify the former decree because of changed circumstances so as to require the father to pay to the mother of the children the sum of $150 per month for her support and the sum of $50 per month for each of the children in her custody. In this petition the fact was alleged that the written contract had been entered into by the parties. .The father filed an answer, plea in bar and cross-bill to the petition for modification, and admitted that he had complied with the terms ‘ ‘ of said pre-divorce contract from the time of the rendition. of the said divorce decree until some time in the month of August 1954. ’ ’ He alleged that the mother had since remarried.
It appears from the separation agreement that the parties agreed that the mother was to have the use of the residence so long as she remained unmarried, and the outcome of that proceeding for modification of the former decree was that the proceeding was dismissed without prejudice on December 13, 1955. But in the meantime it appears that a decree had been rendered on December 8, 1954, upon the petition for modification of the original divorce and custody decree, and wherein the father of the children was required to pay $37.50 to each of the two children then in the custody of the mother, for their support, and that decree provides: ‘ ‘ and that to the end that the said minor children may have a home that the defendant should pay any delinquent payments to the First Federal Savings and Loan Association of Belzoni, Mississippi”.
*88The petition in the instant proceeding for the partition of the homestead property was filed on May 3, 1956, set np certain debits and credits alleged to be dne and owing between the respective parties, and asked for an adjudication of an accounting between them. The appeal here is taken relative to the allowance and disallowance of the debits and credits made by the court in the accounting. Since the petition to reopen the cause, No. 2184, in which the divorce, custody and allowance decrees were rendered, seeks relief from the payment of the alimony of $37.50 per month, and from the payment of any alimony to the mother, and tenders the sum of $525 in full settlement for past due alimony, it is contended by the appellee in the instant appeal that the former pleadings and decrees are properly a part of the record on this appeal. They are not made exhibits to the answer of the defendant to this partition proceeding nor were they introduced upon the trial of the partition suit. Whereas the appellant contends that the former decrees were final decrees and that the instant proceeding is a separate and distinct controversy. But since Section 2743, Code of 1942, provides that “the court (after granting a divorce and awarding custody of children and providing for alimony) may afterwards, on petition, change the decree, and make from time to time such new decrees as the case may require” the former decrees were not final decrees in the cause, and the petition for partition of the homestead property in the instant proceeding does not seek that relief alone, but seeks relief from some of the obligations imposed upon the petitioner by the former decrees, and asks for an accounting between the parties in regard to what he has paid, or was obligated to pay, under the terms thereof.
 Rule No. 2 of the Revised Rules of this Court, together with the cases cited in support of the appellant’s motion to strike the former proceedings referred to therein, would ordinarily entitle the movant to have his mo*89tion sustained, but under the situation presented by the petition to reopen the cause and allow a partition, and for the other relief prayed for as against certain obligations imposed on him by the said former decrees, we are unable to determine without a reading of the entire record on this appeal, and considering the briefs of counsel on the merits of the cause, whether or not the former pleadings and decrees are properly a part of the record on this appeal, and we have therefore concluded that we should neither sustain nor overrule the appellants motion at this time but that the same should be passed for a final disposition until a consideration of the appeal on its merits.
Motion to strike a portion of the record is passed until the consideration of the case on its merits.
Lee, Arrington, Ethridge and Gillespie, JJ., concur.