Rice v. Rice

• Decision Date: 18 April 1949
• Docket Number: No. 117,117
• Citation: 336 U.S. 674,93 L.Ed. 957,69 S.Ct. 751
• Parties: RICE v. RICE
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

336 U.S. 674

69 S.Ct. 751

93 L.Ed. 957

RICE

v RICE.

No. 117.

Argued Dec. 14, 1948.

Decided April 18, 1949.

Mr. Daniel D. Morgan, of New Haven, Conn., for petitioner.

Messrs. Samuel A. Persky and Ralph H. Clark, both of New Haven, Conn., for respondent.

PER CURIAM.

The question for decision here is whether the courts of Connecticut gave to a Nevada divorce decree the full faith and credit required by Art. IV, § 1 of the Constitution. Respondent brought the action in a Connecticut Superior Court, seeking a declaratory judgment that a decree of divorce entered against her and in favor of her husband, the late Herbert N. Rice, by a Nevada court is not entitled to full faith and credit because he was not domiciled in that state at the time the decree was entered. Petitioner, who had married Herbert N. Rice following his divorce, and the administrator of his estate were joined as defendants. The purpose of the action was to determine the widowhood status of the parties and to decide questions concerning the inheritance of the property of the decedent, who dies intestate.

After a full trial, judgment was entered in favor of respondent, and the court's finding that Herbert N. Rice had never established a bona fide domicile in Nevada was affirmed on appeal by the Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut. We granted the petition for certiorari, 335 U.S. 842, 69 S.Ct. 65, to consider petitioner's contention that the Connecticut courts did not fairly discharge the duty of respect owed the Nevada decree under this Court's decisions in Williams v. North Carolina, 325 U.S. 226, 65 S.Ct. 1092, 89 L.Ed. 1577, 157 A.L.R. 1366, and Esenwein v. Commonwealth, 325 U.S. 279, 65 S.Ct. 1118, 89 L.Ed. 1608, 157 A.L.R. 1396.

Upon full consideration of the record, the opinion of the Supreme Court of Errors, and the argument of counsel, we have concluded that the Connecticut courts gave proper weight to the claims of power by the Nevada court, that the burden of proving that the decedent had not acquired a domicile in Nevada was placed upon respondent, that this issue of fact was fairly tried according to appropriate procedure, and that the findings of the Connecticut courts are amply supported in evidence. Our statement in the Esenwein opinion, 325 U.S. at page 281, 65 S.Ct. at page 1119, that 'It is not for us to retry the facts, and we cannot say that in reaching their conclusion the (Connecticut) courts did not have warrant in evidence and did not fairly weight the facts,' is appropriate here.

Sherrer v. Sherrer, 334 U.S. 343, 68 S.Ct. 1087, 1097, and Coe v. Coe, 334 U.S. 378, 68 S.Ct. 1094, 1097, decided by this Court last term, are not in point. No personal service was made upon respondent, nor did she in any way participate in the Nevada proceedings. She was not, therefore, precluded in the present action from challenging the finding of the Nevada court that Herbert N. Rice was, at the time of the divorce, domiciled in that state.

Affirmed.

Mr. Justice BLACK, Mr. Justice DOUGLAS, and Mr. Justice RUTLEDGE dissent.

Mr. Justice JACKSON, dissenting.

Since this case involves only reappraisal of evidence, and we decline to do that, it is hard to see a reason for granting certiorari unless it was to record in our reports an example of the manner in which, in the law of domestic relations, 'confusion now hath made his materpiece.' The question is whether property owned in Connecticut by one who has obtained a Nevada divorce and remarried in that State can be taken from his acting widow and bestowed upon the woman she superseded. The facts are these:

After twenty years of married life in Connecticut with Lillian, Rice arrived at Reno, Nevada, on March 23, 1944, and began a divorce action on May 5. The complaint and process were handed to Lillian at her home in Connecticut. She was not served with process in Nevada. She was teaching school in Connecticut, never had lived in Nevada, and did not appear personally or by attorney in the action, which she claims was a surprise maneuver on the part of Rice.

Rice had rented a furnished room in Reno and testified that he intended to remain there 'indefinitely.' He was awarded a divorce from Lillian on June 13 and wired Hermoine, who arrived there on July 3. They were immediately married and never returned to Connecticut. They retained the room in Reno, which they occupied from time to time, and both obtained war employment in California where six months later Rice died.

Lillian brought an action in Connecticut to have herself declared his widow insofar as Connecticut real estate was concerned. The court reviewed the evidence as to whether Rice established a good faith domicile in Nevada and held that he had not and was not entitled to maintain an action there for devorce. The question comes here as to whether this holding by Connecticut courts gave full faith and credit to the Nevada decree of divorce as required by the Constitution.

In Williams v. North Carolina, 317 U.S. 287, 63 S.Ct. 207, 87 L.Ed. 279, 143 A.L.R. 1273, this Court rode roughshod over the precedents and held that a state court, without personal service of process on the defendant, can on short residence grant a divorce which is valid and entitled to faith and credit in all states. If Rice could have relied on that pronouncement, his divorce from Lillian and his marriage to Hermoine would be without legal flaw, and the latter's widowhood clear.

But in the second case of Williams v. North Carolina, 325 U.S. 226, 65 S.Ct. 1092, 89 L.Ed. 1577, 157 A.L.R. 1366, the Court held that jurisdictional findings by the Nevada court in such a case do not preclude re-examination and a different conclusion on the part of another state. And in Estin v. Estin, 334 U.S. 541, 68 S.Ct. 1213, the Court held that the second state is free to arrive at its own determination as to plaintiff's domicile in determining property rights, even though required, under the Williams cases or either of them, to recognize the divorce judgment as terminating the marriage. Now comes Rice v. Rice to demonstrate the consequences of these doctrines.

Congress, as it is empowered to do by the Full Faith and Credit Clause of ...