Blois v. Blois
| Decision Date | 22 February 1962 |
| Docket Number | No. D-99,D-99 |
| Citation | 138 So.2d 373 |
| Parties | Marilyn BLOIS, Appellant, v. John B. BLOIS, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Richard W. Ervin, Atty. Gen., Reeves Bowen, Asst. Atty. Gen., William A. Hallowes, III, State Atty., and Nathan A. Schevitz, Asst. State Atty., for appellant.
Walter G. Arnold, Jacksonville, for appellee.
The plaintiff in a proceeding under the Uniform Reciprocal Enforcement of Support Law has taken this interlocutory appeal from an order of the Circuit Court for Duval County denying her motion to dismiss a counterclaim for divorce filed by the defendant in that proceeding.
The novel question is thus presented to us on this appeal whether a counterclaim for divorce can properly be filed in an action under the mentioned law in this state.
The record shows that on February 1, 1961, a petition was filed in an Ohio court by the plaintiff against her husband, the defendant, residing in Jacksonville, Florida, for support for herself and their son, then about 40 days old. This petition was filed pursuant to the provisions of the Uniform Reciprocal Enforcement of Support Law (Sec. 3115.01 to 3115.22, Laws of Ohio, and Chapter 88, Florida Statutes), F.S.A. The petition was certified by the Ohio court and transferred to the Florida courts pursuant to the uniform law. A summons, together with a petition and an affidavit of the plaintiff, was served on the defendant, and on April 28, 1961, the defendant answered the petition admitting the marriage but denying he was the father of the child, denying that he had failed to support the petitioner, and alleging that the parties had entered into a separation agreement in 1960 with which the defendant had fully complied, and alleging that a divorce action, instituted by the petitioner, was still pending in Ohio. At the same time the defendant filed in these proceedings a counterclaim for a divorce, charging the plaintiff with extreme cruelty and also demanding that the plaintiff be required to abide by the terms of the said property settlement. The plaintiff then filed a motion to dismiss this counterclaim on the ground that the Circuit Court for Duval County had no jurisdiction to entertain it. The Circuit Court denied this motion in an order from which the plaintiff has taken this appeal.
The Florida Uniform Reciprocal Enforcement of Support Law, being Chapter 88, Florida Statutes, contains the following provisions which throw light on the nature of the proceedings under that law from the point of view of the question of the propriety of the filing of a counterclaim for divorce in a proceeding instituted under such law:
Sec. 88.021, Florida Statutes, F.S.A., states that the purposes of this chapter are to improve and extend by reciprocal legislation 'the enforcement of duties of support' and to make uniform the law with respect thereto. Sec. 88.121 provides that the state attorney 'shall represent the plaintiff in any proceeding initiated in this state under this chapter.' As to procedure, Section 88.201 provides that the court shall conduct proceedings under this chapter 'in the manner prescribed by law for an action for the enforcement of the type of duty of support claimed.' Finally, Section 88.291 declares:
'Participation in any proceedings under this chapter shall not confer upon any court jurisdiction of any of the parties thereto in any other proceeding.'
Certainly it is implicit, if not explicit, from the above-mentioned and other provisions of our Uniform Reciprocal Enforcement of Support Law that the only real issue in a proceeding under that law is the duty of support. The issue of dissolving the bonds of matrimony, while admittedly some of the evidence with regard to such issue might be relevant to the duty to support, is nevertheless extraneous to the real issue of the duty to support. We think that the Legislature in adopting Sec. 88.291, quoted above, intended thereby to preclude the conversion of proceedings under Chapter 88 into a suit for...
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...685-686, 69 Ill.Dec. 510, 447 N.E.2d 945 (1983); Amaker v. Amaker, 28 N.C.App. 558, 561, 221 S.E.2d 917 (1976). Cf. Blois v. Blois, 138 So.2d 373, 374 (Fla.Dist.Ct.App.1962) (evidence of dissolution of a marriage is relevant in determining duty of support); O'Neill v. O'Neill, 420 So.2d 261......
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