Huff v. Huff

• Decision Date: 16 March 1983
• Docket Number: No. C-1266,C-1266
• Citation: 648 S.W.2d 286
• Parties: Milton Paul HUFF, Petitioner, v. Patsy Ann HUFF, Respondent.
• Court: Texas Supreme Court

Page 286

648 S.W.2d 286

Milton Paul HUFF, Petitioner, v. Patsy Ann HUFF, Respondent.

No. C-1266.

Supreme Court of Texas.

March 16, 1983.

Rehearing Denied April 27, 1983.

Jim Sharon Bearden, Orange, for petitioner.

Joseph D. Loidold, Port Arthur, for respondent.

WALLACE, Justice.

This is a motion to reduce past due child support to judgment pursuant to § 14.09(c) of the Texas Family Code. The trial court rendered judgment for Patsy Ann Huff in the amount of $28,098.51, representing unpaid child support for the period from October 9, 1973 to May 1, 1979. The court of appeals affirmed the judgment of the trial court. 634 S.W.2d 5. We affirm the judgment of the court of appeals.

Patsy Ann Huff and Milton Huff were divorced on October 19, 1973. Patsy was named managing conservator of the couple's four children and Milton was ordered to pay child support through the District Clerk's office in the amount of $500 per month until the youngest child reached the age of 18. No payments were made through the District Clerk's office. The youngest child reached 18 years of age in May of 1979. In January of 1979, Patsy filed this motion to reduce the unpaid child support to judgment. At all times pertinent to this action, Milton has resided in Arizona. Following a hearing at which the court heard conflicting testimony as to the amount of child support paid directly to Patsy as well as Milton's contention that he was physically unable to work, the court entered judgment for Patsy. The only point before us is whether the general four-year statute of limitation ¹ or the ten-year statute of limitation for the renewing and enforcement of judgments ² should apply in this case.

It is Milton's contention that the four-year statute should apply. He argues that a motion under § 14.09(c) of the Family Code is an independent claim for relief and not an action to enforce a final judgment. He cites as authority Ex Parte Payne, 598 S.W.2d 312 (Tex.Civ.App.--Texarkana, 1980, no writ) and Ex Parte McNemee, 605 S.W.2d 353 (Tex.Civ.App.--El Paso 1980, no writ). The court in Payne found the four-year statute applicable as a matter of policy. Id. at 317-318. See, in contrast, for courts of appeals applying the ten-year statute, Mitchell v. Mitchell, 575 S.W.2d 311 (Tex.Civ.App.--Dallas 1978, no writ); Houtchens v. Matthews, 557 S.W.2d 581 (Tex.Civ.App.--Fort Worth 1977, writ dism'd).

We note at the outset that a divorce decree which awards child support is a final judgment. "This is true even though portions of the judgment with respect to property were to be performed by parties in the future, and even though the trial court has the power under Section 14.08, Texas Family Code, V.T.C.A. ... to modify or change provisions relating to custody and support of minor children under certain circumstances." Schwartz v. Jefferson, 520 S.W.2d 881, 887 (Tex.1975); see also Curtis v. Gibbs, 511 S.W.2d 263, 266 (Tex.1974); McAfee v. McAfee, 152 Tex. 156, 255 S.W.2d 185, 186 (1953). The only traditional distinction between final divorce decrees and other final judgments has been the remedies available for their enforcement. Since the early periods of Texas jurisprudence, divorce has been treated exclusively as a matter of equity even though Texas has never had a separate equity court. As a judgment in equity, a divorce decree operates only in personam. Prior to enactment of the Family Code in 1973, the sole remedy for the enforcement of a final divorce decree had been an action for contempt brought in the court that issued the decree. See, for discussion, Ex Parte Barnett, 600 S.W.2d 252, 254-255 (Tex.1980). ³ Parties to a divorce did not have the additional at-law option of seeking an in rem execution on such a final judgment in equity. This situation often rendered support awards useless because the spouse to whom back payments were owed would be left without a practical means of collecting them if, as in the instant case, the defaulting spouse had left the jurisdiction of the court that had issued the final decree.

In 1973, the Legislature expanded the jurisdiction of the trial court to allow in rem enforcements of the support portion of a divorce decree under § 14.09(c) of the "Enforcement of Order" provision of the Texas Family Code. See Acts 1973, 63rd Leg., ch. 543, p. 1426. ⁴ We find that the purpose of this section was to facilitate the enforcement of final decrees providing for child support. If a claim for child support is brought as part of an action for a divorce and is then disposed of by the court as part of the divorce adjudication, we presume that once the period for an appeal has run the claim for child support becomes part and parcel of a final judgment. The claim is precluded from further relitigation by operation of the law of res judicata. We have unequivocally held that the possibility of a prospective modification of support payments under § 14.08(c)(2) does not in any way diminish the nature of a divorce decree as a final judgment in this regard. ⁵ Schwartz v. Jefferson, 520 S.W.2d at 887; see also § 13, Comment c, Restatement (Second) of Judgments. ⁶

A § 14.09(c) motion is an in rem parallel to a motion for constructive contempt under § 14.09(a). Both must be predicated by their pleadings on a valid final judgment. Tex.R.Civ.P. 55. If a claimant seeks to assert either a § 14.09(a) or a § 14.09(c) remedy after the ten-year statute of limitation for reviving and enforcing a dormant final judgment has passed, ⁷ the trial court passing on the motion is without jurisdiction to grant any form of relief because the final judgment will have become void of lawful effect by operation of law. See Art. 5532; § 74(2), Restatement (Second) of Judgments. See also Art. 1911a, § 1 (limiting a court's contempt powers to the enforcement of lawful orders).

Both the Payne and McNemee courts apparently assumed that Art. 5529, the four-year catchall statute of limitation, would apply in a situation such as this because § 14.09(c) actions, in their opinion, were collateral claims for relief not covered by any other statute of limitation. See Payne, 598 S.W.2d at 319, and McNemee, 605 S.W.2d at 358. In Adair v. Martin, 595 S.W.2d 513 (Tex.1980), this Court affirmed a court of appeals analysis of a § 14.09(c) motion as an enforcement remedy to assure the payment of child support previously ordered in a final divorce decree. This case involved a § 14.09(c) motion filed by Ms. Adair in 1975 against her former husband's estate to collect past due child support he had owed under a divorce decree issued in 1960. In upholding the validity of the motion as an enforcement of the decree, the Court specifically indicated that a § 14.09(c) remedy was not an independent claim for indebtedness. Id. at 514; see also Smith v. Bramhall, 556 S.W.2d 112 (Tex.Civ.App. Waco 1977) writ ref'd n.r.e. per curiam, 563 S.W.2d 238 (Tex.1978) (making the same distinction between § 14.09(c) and a collateral claim for a debt).

The inference to be drawn from this Court's writings in Adair and Smith is that a motion under § 14.09(c), like a motion for contempt under § 14.09(a) of the same statute, is but one of several means specifically provided by the legislature to enforce judgments awarding child support. As a matter of the law of res judicata, such motions are clearly not separate claims that would come under the Art. 5529 catchall statute of limitation because the original divorce decree has precluded any further adjudication of a right to child support. ⁸ For a setting out of the law of res judicata, see Ogletree v. Crates, 363 S.W.2d 431, 435-436 (Tex.1963); Freeman v. McAninch, 87 Tex. 132, 27 S.W. 97, 100 (1894). The fact that a parent facing sanctions under § 14.09(a) or § 14.09(c) has a right to be heard on the issue of arrearages does not mean the claim for child support is being relitigated. To the contrary, we have held that such hearings, as in the charge of contempt, are provided to guarantee due process of law, not a de novo hearing on the right to support. For a discussion of required procedural protections in cases of constructive contempt, see Ex Parte White, 149 Tex. 155, 229 S.W.2d 1002, 1004 (1950); Id. 229 S.W.2d at 1005 (Garwood, J., dissenting).

As motions to revive and enforce portions of a final judgment awarding child support, § 14.09(c) actions come within the direct purview of the statute of limitation governing the revival and enforcement of judgments, Art. 5532, the ten-year statute. Inasmuch as § 14.09(c) motions are included within the prescription of Art. 5532 to deal with the revival and enforcement of judgments, they are excluded from the ambit of Art. 5529 by the very language of that statute which narrows its application to only those "... action[s] ... for which no limitation is otherwise prescribed ...." (emphasis added).

On the basis of a plain reading of the statutes of limitation, the provision of § 14.09(c) as it appears under the title of "Enforcement of Order," and our prior holdings in Adair and Smith that interpret § 14.09(c) as an enforcement remedy, it is incumbent upon this Court to follow its own precedent as well as implement the legislature's clear plan to augment the remedies available for the effective enforcement of child support orders. The ten-year statute of limitation must therefore apply to § 14.09(c) motions as it does to motions for contempt under § 14.09(a). We are no more able to limit § 14.09(c) in rem remedies than we would be able to limit the contempt power of the court under § 14.09(a). If we were to do so, we would be opening the door to the wholesale frustration of the ten-year statute of limitation for all final judgments in this important area of family law. Such a usurpation of the legislative function is beyond the jurisdiction of this Court. We therefore disapprove Payne and McNemee and affirm the judgment of the court of appeals.

RAY, J., files a dissenting opinion in which BARROW, CA...