Court Opinion

ID: 9572581
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:42:57.361882+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:33:31.879580
License: Public Domain

HENDERSON, Justice
(dissenting).
In Johansen v. Johansen, 365 N.W.2d 859 (S.D.1985), we held, inter alia, that ... “obligations credited under settlement agreements that become decreed property dispositions are not based on contracts or agreements between the parties; but rather they are obligations ordered by the Court.” See also, Hanks v. Hanks, 334 N.W.2d 856 (S.D.1983). If we stand by precedent, the majority opinion crumples.
I call attention to SDCL 53-9-1 which provides:
A contract provision contrary to an express provision of law or to the policy of express law, though not expressly prohibited or otherwise contrary to good morals, is unlawful.
*284Therefore, if the majority opinion can rely on a “contract” (which it cannot under settled South Dakota law), the “contract” is also contrary to United States Supreme Court decisions, and the express enactment of the United States Congress. Perforce, the “contract” is contrary to the national “policy of express law” and SDCL 53-9-1. Therefore, this Court has no jurisprudential authority to frustrate the deliberate purpose of the United States Congress nor to nullify the serviceman’s choice by a circuitous design, fluidity of words, and misinterpretation of United States Supreme Court decisions nor should it oppose South Dakota Supreme Court opinions and a state statute.
The majority opinion simply frustrates the holding in Ridgway v. Ridgway, 454 U.S. 46, 102 S.Ct. 49, 70 L.Ed.2d 39 (1981). The 1976 decision in the State of New York, Will of Hilton, upon which the majority opinion relies upon so heavily, pales under the Ridgway decision, which was decided approximately five years after the New York State Court decision.
It is obviously the judgment of this Court, under a three Justice plurality decision, that there is a fixed, rigid adjudication (judgment) of $10,000 plus interest. Thus, it is for the exact amount of the serviceman’s policy plus interest. By legal mirrors, a leap of logic is developed in the majority opinion: We hold that South Dakota’s courts may not prohibit the owner of a NSLI policy from changing the beneficiary as he or she desires — and then do the opposite. I agree with this statement in the majority opinion: “Clearly Congress intended by 38 U.S.C. § 717(a) to give covered service veterans the freedom to name and to change beneficiaries at will.”
Now to the Colorado case, dusted off by the majority opinion. In Re Estate of Pechman, 532 P.2d 385 (Colo.App.1975). It expresses:
The estate correctly asserts that the portion of the divorce decree purporting to direct the disposition of the National Service Life Insurance proceeds is void and can therefore be collaterally attacked in the probate court. National Service Life Insurance is a contract made in pursuance of federal statute and must be construed with reference to such statute,1 the regulations promulgated thereunder, and the decisions applicable thereto, rather than by laws and decisions governing private insurance companies. Kauffman v. Kauffman, 93 Cal.App.2d 808, 210 P.2d 29.
Any order in a divorce decree purporting to restrict the right of the policyholder of National Service Life Insurance to change the beneficiary, at any time under any circumstances, is void and unenforceable. Wissner v. Wissner, 338 U.S. 655, 70 S.Ct. 398, 94 L.Ed. 424; Hoffman v. United States, 391 F.2d 195 (9th Cir.); Williams v. Williams, 255 N.C. 315, 121 S.E.2d 536; Kauffman v. Kauffman, supra. It was on this basis that we previously held that the courts of Colorado have no jurisdiction to exercise any control over the designation of beneficiaries under National Service Life Insurance policies. Reed v. Reed, 29 Colo.App. 199, 481 P.2d 125 (citing Heifner v. Soderstrom, 134 F.Supp. 174 (N.D.Iowa)). Therefore, we hold in this case that the divorce court never obtained jurisdiction to enter any orders relative to the specific subject matter and that the portion of the divorce decree which attempted to do so was void ab initio, as opposed to merely voidable, and, therefore, can be collaterally attacked in the probate court. Estate of Lee v. Graber, 170 Colo. 419, 462 P.2d 492. The claim therefore, having no valid basis, should have been disallowed.
The Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia, which gives firmament to my dissent, has held:
We are of the opinion that the agreement, alleged in the amended bill of complaint to have been entered into by the plaintiff and the insured, was invalid, insofar as it affected the right and au*285thority of the insured to change the beneficiary under the contract of insurance. To hold otherwise would do violence to the plain and ordinary meaning of the language expressive of the legislative intent. (Emphasis added.)
Von Der Lippi-Lipski v. United States, et al., 4 F.2d 168, 169 (CADC 1925).
In Kimball v. United States, et al., 304 F.2d 864 (6th Cir.1962), the issue was stated thusly:
The issue in this case is whether an insured veteran under a United States Government of Life Insurance Policy can effectively contract away his right to change the beneficiary of his policy, p. 864.
Indeed, the case is in point as it involved a divorce with an agreement incorporated into the divorce decree whereby the veteran was to maintain the said life insurance policy and his former spouse as the beneficiary thereon. The District of Columbia Court of Appeals held, in effect, that a veteran cannot contract away his statutory right, referring to the “concise and comprehensive opinion” of the district court which is reported in Kimball v. United States et al., 197 F.Supp. 124 (N.D.Ohio 1961).
In yet another case involving a divorce decree requiring the insured veteran to maintain his former wife as the sole beneficiary of his National Service Life Insurance policies, where the veteran had subsequently changed the beneficiary designation, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit expressly held that a state court does not have the power to effectively require a veteran to maintain a former wife as beneficiary on NSLI policies therein quoting and following Wissner, supra; Hoffman v. United States, 391 F.2d 195 (9th Cir.1968).
All of appellant’s various theories (her Motion to Amend on breach of contract was never granted; appellee has not been given an opportunity to file answer thereto) come pouring out of a provision of the Divorce Decree. The provision orders Ray Milliken to maintain her as beneficiary of his NSLI policy. All claims, emanating therefrom, must therefore fail.
I would affirm the trial court.

. The two sections of the Federal Statutes applicable to the instant problem are found in 38 U.S.C. § 3101(a) and 38 U.S.C. § 717(a).