Purdon v. Blinn

• Decision Date: 20 June 1906
• Parties: PURDON v. BLINN.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

192 Mass. 387

78 N.E. 462

PURDON v. BLINN.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

June 20, 1906

COUNSEL

Fred A. Fernald, for petitioner.

Adams & Blinn, for respondent.

OPINION

KNOWLTON C.J.

This is a petition brought under Rev. Laws, c. 144, § 9, relative to property in the hands of a person appointed receiver of the estate of a resident of the commonwealth who 'has disappeared, absconded, or is absent therefrom and has left no agent therein and his whereabouts are unknown.' This section is as follows 'The court may order said property, or its proceeds acquired by mortgage, lease or sale, to be applied in payment of charges incurred or that may be incurred in the support and maintenance of the absentee's wife and minor children, and to the discharge of such debts as may be proved against said absentee.'

The petitioner was the wife of the absentee, and she obtained from him a divorce a vinculo, with a decree for alimony in gross to the amount of $4,000. For this, execution was issued, and she made her petition to the probate court to have it proved and allowed as a debt against the estate of her former husband, in the hands of the receiver. The principal question in the case is whether this is a debt within the meaning of the statute.

The origin of the claim in the obligation of the husband to provide for her support does not militate against its allowance; for the statute provides for the payment of charges of this kind which are not directly debts. A decree for alimony in a gross sum, which is a final ajudication for the payment of the amount named, is within the constitutional provision that 'full faith and credit shall be given in each state * * * to the judicial proceedings of other states.' A suit may be brought to enforce the payment of it as a debt, in a state other than that in which it was entered. Page v. Page, 189 Mass. 85, 75 N.E. 92. An obligation under such a decree is plainly in the nature of a debt, and for most purposes it can fairly be called a debt. In Gray v. Bennett, 3 Metc. 522-526, the court said 'The word 'debt' is of large import including not only debts of record or judgments and debts by specialty, * * * and in its popular sense includes all that is due to a man under any form of obligation or promise. And long ago it was held, as expressed by Blackstone, that 'whatever the laws order anyone to pay, that becomes incidentally a debt which he hath beforehand contracted to discharge.” In Howard v. Howard, 15 Mass. 196, in referring to a liability for alimony, the court used this language: 'The debt is certain and it is proved by record, and the decree is in effect as much a judgment as if rendered on the common-law side of the court.' Mr. Justice Field, in Knapp v. Knapp, 134 Mass. 353, said, 'A decree for alimony, whether for alimony already due or to become due in the future is in a certain sense a debt of record established by a judgment.' So in Chase v. Chase, 105 Mass. 385, Mr. Justice Morton speaking of divorce a vinculo and divorce a mensa et thoro, said, 'The judgment for alimony in either case creates a debt of record in favor of the wife.' ...