Rawson v. Rawson

• Decision Date: 23 June 1892
• Citation: 31 N.E. 653,156 Mass. 578
• Parties: RAWSON v. RAWSON et al.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

156 Mass. 578

31 N.E. 653

RAWSON v. RAWSON et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Worcester.

June 23, 1892

COUNSEL

Thayer & Rugg, for petitioner.

Joshua E. Beeman, for respondent.

OPINION

KNOWLTON J.

This case presents the question whether, when two persons have contracted marriage in good faith in the belief that each can lawfully marry, and it is subsequently discovered that the marriage is void because one of the parties has a former husband or wife alive, a libel for annulling the marriage can be maintained by the survivor after the death of the other party. Pub.St. c. 145,§ 11, which provides for proceedings to annul or affirm a marriage whose validity is doubted, makes these proceedings closely analogous to proceedings for divorce. Under the statute "either party may file the libel;" that is to say, either party to the supposed marriage, and not another person interested in the marriage. "Such libel shall be filed in the same manner as a libel for divorce, and all the provisions of chapter 146 relative to libels for divorce *** shall, so far as applicable, apply to libels under this section." Section 11. The statute plainly contemplates proceedings between the original parties to the marriage, and these can only be had while they are both alive. It has always been held in England that petitions for a decree of nullity of a marriage cannot be maintained after the death of one of the parties. Hinks v. Harris, 4 Mod. 182; Hemming v. Price, 12 Mod. 432; Brownsword v. Edwards, 2 Ves.Sr. 245; 2 Bish.Mar. & Div. § 298, and cases cited. We have been referred to no authority in which a libel of this kind has been sustained in this country, and it would seem that, except where there are special statute provisions, the law in the American states is the same as in England. Fornshill v. Murray, 1 Bland, 479; Pingree v. Goodrich, 41 Vt. 47. The reasons on which such proceedings are ordinarily founded are inapplicable to a case in which one of the parties is dead. While both are living, and the marriage apparently in force it may be important to have their status determined by an adjudication, rather than that they should remain in doubt in regard to the validity of the marriage. But where death terminates the marriage relation, this reason no longer exists. Moreover, there are grave objections to permitting one of the parties, after the death of the other, to have a decree which shall relate...