Court Opinion

ID: 9647064
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 13:22:27.19055+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:45.131611
License: Public Domain

*247Morse, J.,
dissenting. I do not agree with the Court’s assumption that spousal maintenance in this case could not, under any circumstances, be awarded under 15 V.S.A. § 758 (modification of maintenance). Should spousal maintenance be forever barred if it is waived or not reserved in the divorce judgment? I do not think so. The relevant Vermont statutes, and the policy underpinning them, support relief in this case. I respectfully dissent.
The issue of maintenance is governed by 15 V.S.A. § 752, which gives the family court discretion to award maintenance from one spouse to the other upon a showing of certain criteria. After a divorce, 15 V.S.A. § 758 allows the court “upon a showing of a real, substantial, and unanticipated change of circumstances” to “annul, vary or modify a judgment relative to maintenance.” This discretionary authority may be exercised “from time to time,” depending on how and to what degree circumstances vary. Id.
In my view, the substance of the family court’s modification in this case was authorized by the plain meaning of § 758. The initial “judgment relative to maintenance,” which in part stated, “Neither party shall be entitled to alimony, now or permanently in the future,” was modified to provide the wife use of the former marital residence. While the modification did not require the payment of money, the use of the home was its functional equivalent.
The facts of this case and the legal criteria demonstrating the wife’s need for maintenance are a perfect fit. The only argument against treating this case as one for maintenance is the form, of the original judgment, which characterized as a property distribution the need of the wife to use the home. The Court’s three rationales denying the wife relief'boil down to a “So what?” A mere change of label from property distribution to alimony in the divorce judgment would have, under the Court’s view, changed the outcome of this case. I demur from the Court’s technical approach.
No Vermont case prohibits the award of maintenance here. Vermont precedents like Loeb v. Loeb, 118 Vt. 472, 483-86, 114 A.2d 518, 526-28 (1955) (only existing maintenance in foreign judgment may be modified), and Grant v. Grant, 136 Vt. 9, 14, 383 A.2d 627, 629-30 (1978) (same), are not impediments. They deal with foreign divorces and must be read in conjunction with Poston v. Poston, 160 Vt. 1, 8, 624 A.2d 853, 857 (maintenance action may be pursued in Vermont after foreign divorce not providing for maintenance), cert. denied, — U.S. —, 114 S. Ct. 66 (1993).
As noted, Loeb, Grant, and Poston all address whether a Vermont court may award maintenance after a foreign court has granted a *248divorce without making a maintenance provision. In Loeb, when husband obtained a “quickie” divorce in Nevada without any provisions for alimony, wife brought an action in Vermont and obtained support. The Court held, under a predecessor statute to 15 V.S.A. § 752, the then statutory authority for granting alimony, that alimony was an incident of divorce and that in the absence of an action granting divorce, trial courts had no jurisdiction to order it. Id. at 484-85, 114 A.2d at 526-27. In addition, no independent action for alimony was available at common law. Id. at 486, 114 A.2d at 527.
In Poston, we in effect overruled Loeb, holding that termination of a marriage did not automatically bar a later separate maintenance award. 160 Vt. at 8, 624 A.2d at 857. We interpreted 15 V.S.A. § 752, the current statute authorizing maintenance, differently than the Court interpreted its predecessor in Loeb, and held that the language limiting maintenance to “spouse” did not preclude maintenance after divorce. Id. at 7-8, 624 A.2d at 856-57. We recognized that “the law concerning the award of maintenance has not remained stagnant since the Loeb decision” and joined the majority of states that allow an independent suit for maintenance after a foreign ex parte divorce. Id. at 8, 624 A.2d at 857.
I recognize that in contrast to the rule on foreign divorces, the general rule on domestic divorce orders containing no maintenance provisions is that spouses are foreclosed from making later maintenance requests unless there is an express reservation of the issue in the divorce order. See, e.g., Benavidez v. Benavidez, 660 P.2d 1017, 1020 (N.M. 1983); Becker v. Becker, 262 N.W.2d 478, 483 (N.D. 1978). This rule is based on the theory that the divorce court no longer has jurisdiction of the maintenance issue once the divorce is final. In several states, it has led family law practitioners to seek nominal maintenance awards in every case in order to reserve the issue. See, e.g., McNally v. McNally, 516 So. 2d 499, 502, 503 (Miss. 1987) (urging trial courts to reserve maintenance issue in every case it is not awarded to avoid this ruse).
An explicit reservation of the maintenance issue, however, ought not be necessary to guarantee jurisdiction. See Cody v. Cody, 154 P. 952, 955 (Utah 1916) (every divorce decree should be treated as if maintenance issue had been reserved). Rather, the financial aspects of the divorce order should be seen as an integrated whole designed to provide the fairest complete resolution of all the issues for both parties. It is the divorce judgment, of which maintenance is one aspect, that parties seek to modify. Compare 15 V.S.A. § 758 (“court *249may from time to time annul, vary or modify a judgment relative to maintenance” upon a showing of changed circumstances) with the language of the prior version of this statute analyzed in Grant, 136 Vt. at 12, 383 A.2d at 629 (“After a decree for alimony... the court may revise and alter its decree from time to time . . . respecting the amount of such alimony . . . .”). Nothing in § 758 suggests that, merely because the divorce judgment is silent on maintenance, it cannot' be modified with respect to maintenance. See Kinsman v. Kinsman, 748 P.2d 210, 213-16 (Utah Ct. App. 1988) (Jackson, J., concurring) (construing Utah’s divorce modification statutes to allow maintenance to be awarded at modification because court has continuing jurisdiction over divorce decree and that decree is only res judicata as to circumstances as they exist at the time of divorce, not as to changed circumstances requiring further adjudication).
I find no meaningful distinction that would allow a separate maintenance action after a foreign divorce but not allow modification of a domestic one or that would allow modification when maintenance is initially awarded in any amount but not when maintenance is absent from the judgment. If maintenance was omitted from the divorce judgment because, for example, the wife did not ask for it or the husband lacked ability to pay, and if her needs later become pressing and he is then able to pay, then the wife should be able to bring an action to receive an appropriate sum. See 2 H. Clark, The Law of Domestic Relations in the United States § 17.4, at 244 (2d ed. 1987); Reynierson v. Reynierson, 303 S.W.2d 252, 253, 254 (Ky. 1957) (maintenance may be awarded after divorce judgment where failure to do so would cause a miscarriage of justice). Husband’s reliance on the divorce judgment, relevant to the equities between the parties, can be taken into account. 2 Clark, supra, § 17.4, at 244.
Supporting the no-maintenance-after-divorce rule is the policy of finality. Each spouse knows that the marriage is terminated and can plan accordingly without the threat of unexpected financial demands from an ex-spouse. Equally important policy considerations, however, may weigh in favor of modification. If wife here had received even token maintenance at the outset, there would be no doubt that she could return to court, argue changed circumstances, and receive a modification. The right to maintenance — especially in long-term marriages where significant life choices have been made in reliance on the marriage — should not rest on serendipity, whether, for example, a serious medical condition or an inability to maintain employment becomes known the day before the divorce judgment or the day after. *250By creating a rule that bars future maintenance, we encourage spouses to needlessly litigate this issue as the only avenue to insure against future change. Similarly, trial courts give maintenance in a doubtful case in order to keep jurisdiction over the issue. See, e.g., Henry v. Henry, 162 Vt. 613, 613, 643 A.2d 845, 845 (1994) (mem.) ($l-a-year maintenance provided because employment future for one spouse seemed doubtful).
My proposed approach would not upset the reasonable expectations of the potential obligor of a long-term marriage. In Klein v. Klein, 150 Vt. 466, 473, 555 A.2d 382, 387 (1988), we adopted the view that maintenance is intended to offset the hardships of divorce, that ‘“having entered one of the strongest and most fundamental relationships known to the law, [married persons] must continue to bear its financial burden where [they] can reasonably do so and where it is necessary in order to prevent a relatively greater hardship’” to the less financially secure spouse. Id. (quoting 2 Clark, supra, § 17.5, at 254-55). Society is, of course, willing to help offset that hardship in appropriate cases. But the parties who chose the marriage and arranged their lives around its benefits should be the first to absorb its burdens.
I would affirm.