Lefferts v. Lefferts
| Decision Date | 28 November 1933 |
| Citation | 263 N.Y. 131,188 N.E. 279 |
| Parties | LEFFERTS v. LEFFERTS. |
| Court | New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Action by Elsie Lefferts against Harry M. Lefferts for separation and support and maintenance. From a judgment of the Appellate Division (238 App. Div. 37, 262 N. Y. S. 671) reversing on the law and facts a judgment of the Special Term for plaintiff, and making new findings of fact and of law, plaintiff appeals.
Judgment of Appellate Division affirmed.
Appeal from Supreme Court, Appellate Division, First department.
Solon Rosenthal and I. Maurice Wormser, both of New York City, for appellant.
Julius Schwartz, of Brooklyn, and Hamilton Lieb, of New York City, for respondent.
On June 15, 1902, the plaintiff married one Julius Oppenheimer of the city and state of New York, and thereafter lived with him until the year 1915. Oppenheimer left his wife without support, but apparently did not leave the city of New York, where he continued to live during all the times hereinafter mentioned. In February of 1916, the wife, then Mrs. Oppenheimer, went to Reno, Nev., with her two children, the issue of said marriage. She remained there until December of the same year, when she came back to Brooklyn to live with her mother. In Reno Mrs. Oppenheimer took an apartment of three rooms, kept house for herself and children, sent her children to school, and voted in the September elections of 1916. Six months' residence was necessary in Nevada in order to bring an action for divorce. An action for divorce against Oppenheimer was commenced, he being served without the state and by publication. He did not appear in the action, and at all times remained a resident and citizen of the state of New York. A decree for absolute divorce, upon the ground of cruelty and desertion, having been granted by the Nevada courts, the wife, a month later, returned with her children to Brooklyn, N. Y., and did not again leave the state of New York, except on temporary visits. In January of 1917 she commenced a proceeding in the Domestic Relations Court of Brooklyn, N. Y., to compel her divorced husband to support the children, in which proceeding she made an affidavit stating that she was a resident of Brooklyn.
Before going to Nevada, Mrs. Oppenheimer had become acquatinted, in New York, with a Dr. Lefferts. He had advised her about going West, and wrote her while she was in Reno. At one time she stated that he had advised her to get a divorce in Reno. Subsequently, in 1917, she married Dr. Lefferts in Indiana, while he was temporarily sojourning there as a soldier at the outbreak of the war. Neither Dr. Lefferts nor his wife was a resident of Indiana. After his return from the Army, they took up their residence in New York, and continued to live together as husband and wife until 1930, when they separated.
In this action, which she has brought against her husband, Dr. Lefferts, for separation and support and maintenance, he has pleaded that their marriage in 1917 was void, as Mrs. Lefferts had not been legally divorced in Nevada from her then husband, Julius Oppenheimer.
The trial court, having found as a fact that the then Mrs. Oppenheimer had...
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Hamm v. Hamm
...as follows: "All the cited cases divide themselves into two categories. Fisher v. Fisher [254 N.Y. 463, 173 N.E. 680], Lefferts v. Lefferts, [263 N.Y. 131, 188 N.E. 279], Stevens v. Stevens, [273 N.Y. 157, 7 N.E.2d 26, 109 A.L.R. 1016], Davis v. Davis [279 N.Y. 657, 18 N.E.2d 301] and Vose ......
- In re Holmes' Estate
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Hamm v. Hamm
...as follows: 'All the cited cases divide themselves into two categories. Fisher v. Fisher [254 N.Y. 463, 173 N.E. 680], Lefferts v. Lefferts, [263 N.Y. 131, 188 N.E. 279], Stevens v. Stevens, [273 157, 7 N.E.2d 26, 109 A.L.R. 1016], Davis v. Davis [279 N.Y. 657, 18 N.E.2d 301] and Vose v. Vo......
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State v. Williams, 291.
...not exist, the record would be a nullity, notwithstanding a recital in the judgment that such facts did exist. See Lefferts v. Lefferts, 263 N.Y. 131, 188 N.E. 279, and Forster v. Forster, -- Misc--, 46 N.Y.S.2d 320. There remains to be considered the constitutionality of the statute under ......