MCNEE VS. MCNEE (DIVORCE)

Key holdings

Practitioner summary

Appeal from a judgment annulling a marriage and from the order denying a new trial. The complaint pleaded two causes under Rev. Laws 2355 (annulment for want of understanding rendering a party incapable of assent, or for fraud, where there has been no subsequent voluntary cohabitation): (1) want of understanding occasioned by intoxication at the April 1921 Ingersoll, Ontario ceremony, and (2) fraudulent persuasion for pecuniary advantage, on which no evidence was offered. Non-cohabitation was conclusively proven. The sole question was whether substantial evidence supported the finding of incapacitating intoxication. Applying the deferential standard of Dunphy v. Dunphy, 161 Cal. 380, 119 P. 512 (review begins and ends with whether an unprejudiced mind might reasonably reach the trial court's conclusion; conflicts are resolved below), the court affirmed: plaintiff's own testimony of near-total non-recollection, the club steward's account of extreme drunkenness at 1:30 a.m., and the depositions of the three McNee brothers, the family accountant, and solicitor Graydon describing plaintiff as stupid, dazed, and reeking of liquor within about two hours after the noon ceremony furnished substantial evidence, and lay opinions of incapacity from qualified observers could be weighed by the trial court. The court noted that evidence of drunkenness shortly before and after the ceremony, standing alone, would not sustain annulment - the burden is clear and satisfactory proof of incapacity at the time of the ceremony - but such evidence is material in connection with the whole record. Judgment affirmed; one justice concurred and one dissented, each without opinion.

In plain language

A husband sued to annul his marriage, alleging that when he went through a marriage ceremony at Ingersoll, Ontario, Canada, in April 1921, he was so intoxicated that he lacked the understanding to consent, and (in a second claim, later abandoned for lack of proof) that the wife had fraudulently persuaded him into the marriage for financial advantage. It was undisputed that the parties never lived together afterward - he left for New York the same day on his family's and a solicitor's advice, and the parties did not meet again until the trial in Reno. The trial court, sitting without a jury, annulled the marriage on September 20, 1924, and the wife appealed. The Nevada Supreme Court affirmed. Under the statute, a marriage may be annulled when a party, for want of understanding, was incapable of assenting to it, provided there was no subsequent voluntary cohabitation. The only question was whether substantial evidence supported the finding of incapacitating intoxication, and the court held it did: the husband testified he had been drinking heavily and had only a dim, hazy recollection of the ceremony; the steward of the London Hunt Club described him as very drunk at 1:30 a.m. the night before; and his three brothers, the family accountant, and a solicitor who saw him within hours after the noon ceremony all described him as stupid, dazed, and reeking of liquor. Conflicts in the evidence - the wife's witnesses said he was not drunk - were for the trial court to resolve. One justice concurred separately and one dissented, both without opinion.