Eaton v. Eaton
| Citation | 132 A. 10 |
| Parties | EATON et al. v. EATON et al. |
| Decision Date | 05 January 1926 |
| Court | Supreme Court of New Hampshire |
Transferred from Superior Court, Hillsborough County; Burque, Judge.
Bill in equity by Emma M. Eaton and another against Perry A. Eaton and others for support from the funds of a spendthrift trust. Plaintiffs are the divorced wife and guardian of the minor child of the beneficiary of the trust. Case transferred on trustee's exceptions to orders for the payment of certain amounts to each plaintiff. Decree set aside.
Tuttle, Wyman & Starr, of Manchester (E. E. Wyman, of Manchester, orally), for plaintiffs.
Warren, Howe & Wilson, of Manchester, for the trustee.
While in the previous decision in the case (Eaton v. Eaton, 81 N. H. 275. 125 A. 433, 35 A. L. R. 1034) it was held that the fund was to be used for the beneficiary and his family, the case did not determine who the family were. This question is one of construction of the instrument creating the trust, the language of which appears in the opinion of the previous decision, which opinion does not consider and define what persons made up the family as included within the testator's provisions for his son's needs. This question was not involved so as to be in issue.
By the decision, the fund is to be used for the beneficiary's needs, his creditors cannot reach it, and the plaintiff wife's award of alimony stands no better than any other judgment debt in an effort to have it paid from the fund. By parity of reasoning, the claim for support since the divorce, enforceable in the same manner as the alimony award, may not be collected from the fund, unless the claimant was a member of the beneficiary's family during the period for which support is claimed. Such period is almost entirely subsequent to the divorce.
The inquiry being what relationships and situations the testator probably had in mind to entitle persons as members of his son's family to support from the fund, obviously the claimant's needs do not control the testator's wishes. Within the application of the beneficiary's needs his needs include his family's, but that his family includes his wife since the divorce does not follow. The testator, in omitting mention of her, intended not to have the fund used for her support except while she remained a member of his son's family. If confirmation of this were required, it is furnished in the fact that by the will no unexpended part of the fund goes to her in the event of her survival of the son, even as his widow.
In ordinary and common understanding marriage creates family membership between the parties, and divorce destroys it. The divorce completely dissolving the marital status, thereafter there are no ties either of kinship or marital status to relate the parties. In law, and usually in fact, the parties upon divorce become strangers to each other and no one thinks of calling a divorced man and woman members of each other's family. If the man remarries, the former wife and the new one are not members of one and a common family. If until then the former wife remained a member of his family, then his act of remarriage would terminate her relationship in such respect without action of any kind on her part. Similarly, if the woman remarries, her former husband and her new one do not belong to the same family. Nor is the duty to support a divorcing wife a test of the relationship. The fact that the law affords unusual remedies to enforce the duty does not affect the situation. Dependency does not determine family status.
The implied inclusion of the needs of the son's family within his own needs gives no indication that the testator meant that the family should have any unusual scope of inclusion beyond its generally understood meaning. The creation of a spendthrift trust showed a purpose that creditors and claimants generally should not reach it, and no discrimination was made between the relative character of his son's obligations. Exact and precise definition of family membership is not here called for. It is sufficient to say that the will does not treat the son's wife after her...
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