LAGEMANN VS. LAGEMANN (DIVORCE)

Key holdings

Practitioner summary

The defendant wife appealed from a judgment granting the plaintiff husband an absolute divorce on three years' separation without cohabitation (sec. 9467.06, N.C.L. 1931-1941 Supp.; Stats. 1939, ch. 23), awarding him custody of the two minor daughters, and ordering him to pay her $45 per month support, and from the order denying a new trial. The parties separated June 10, 1937, upon the wife's adjudication of insanity and commitment in Madison County, Illinois; she was paroled in 1940 or 1941, obtained an Illinois separate-maintenance decree in 1944 (modified 1945 and 1947), and was restored to civil rights October 30, 1947. The court (Brown, D.J.) held: (1) the evidence fully supported the findings, including that the wife had been sane and competent since her release and that the continued separation was not the result of insanity - she expressly denied incompetency in her supplemental answer and established her competency at trial, waiving her insanity defenses; (2) under George v. George, 56 Nev. 12, the trial court's discretion turns not on comparative rectitude but on the probability of the spouses being able to live together to their and society's best interests; (3) a separate-maintenance decree is not a bar to a three-years'-separation divorce (George; Schuster v. Schuster); and (4) the statute is constitutional: it does not impair the obligation of contracts (Dartmouth College Case; Hunt v. Hunt; Maynard v. Hill via Tipping v. Tipping), does not offend full faith and credit because the Nevada issues differ from those litigated in Illinois (Estin v. Estin; Kreiger v. Kreiger), and the wife - personally served, personally appearing by counsel, and fully participating - received due process (Sherrer v. Sherrer). Affirmed.

In plain language

A husband obtained a Clark County divorce on the ground that he and his wife had lived separate and apart for more than three years. The couple had separated in 1937, when the wife was adjudged insane in Illinois and committed to a state hospital; she was released to relatives around 1940-41, and an Illinois court later gave her a separate-maintenance award and, in 1947, restored her civil rights. She appealed the Nevada divorce, arguing the evidence was insufficient, that the Illinois separate-maintenance decree barred the divorce, and that Nevada's three-year separation statute was unconstitutional as impairing the marriage contract, denying full faith and credit to the Illinois decree, and violating due process. The Nevada Supreme Court affirmed on every point. The wife herself denied incompetency and proved her competency at trial, waiving any insanity-based defense, and the evidence showed she had been sane and living near her husband for years without ever suggesting reconciliation. Under settled law, a separate-maintenance decree is no bar to a three-year separation divorce, and comparative fault matters less than whether the spouses could ever again live together to the benefit of themselves and society. The constitutional attacks failed under U.S. Supreme Court authority: marriage is a status subject to legislative regulation, not a contract protected from divorce legislation; the Nevada action presented different issues from the Illinois proceeding; and the wife, who appeared personally with counsel and fully participated, received due process.