Welch v. Welch

1930 OK 485, 292 P. 824, 145 Okla. 286, 1930 Okla. LEXIS 222
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedOctober 28, 1930
Docket21067
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 1930 OK 485 (Welch v. Welch) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Welch v. Welch, 1930 OK 485, 292 P. 824, 145 Okla. 286, 1930 Okla. LEXIS 222 (Okla. 1930).

Opinion

OULLISON, J.

This case comes to this court on appeal from the district court of Ouster county, Okla. Plaintiff in error, Beulah H. Welch, was plaintiff in the lower court, and defendant in error, A, J. Welch, was defendant in the lower court, and the parties will hereinafter be referred to as they appeared below.

This action is an action for an absolute divorce filed April 27, 1929, by plaintiff, Beulah Welch, against her husbahd, A. J. Welch, defendant herein.

The grounds set out in plaintiff’s petition and upon wjiich ,her cause of action is based, are that the defendant had for many years past been guilty of gross neglect of duty towards the plaintiff; that defendant had been guilty of acts constituting extreme cruelty towards the plaintiff, and that the defendant had been guilty of adultery. No children were born of the union.

The prayer of plaintiff’s petition was for a decree of absolute divorce from said defendant; an equitable adjustment and division of all property rights between the parties, and suitable allowance for attorneys’ fees and costs.

The defendant, on June 4, 1929, filed his answer, in form a general denial, and also filed a cross-petition seeking a divorce from the plaintiff upon the ground of extreme cruelty.

The case was heard by the trial court, without a jury, upon the petition of plaintiff, the answer and cross-petition of defendant, and the issues thus joined.

The court found from the evidence that plaintiff, Beulah Welch, was entitled to a divorce from the defendant, A. J. Welch, and so decreed. In adjusting the property rights of the parties the court made findings as to the total net value of the defendant’s property, which findings will be hereinafter fully set out, and awarded the plaintiff approximately one-half of the same as alimony award, together with attorney fees and costs.

Plaintiff, the prevailing party in the lower court, in due time filed a motion for new trial, which motion was overruled, and from the order overruling said motion, plaintiff prosecutes this appeal.

Plaintiff sets out numerous assignments of error,, but the controlling questions presented to this court for consideration and determination are embodied in the following propositions, namely:

(1) The purported decree of divorce granted is not valid.

(2) The court abused its discretion in the division of -property.

1. Plaintiff first contends that the decree of divorce granted is void, in that the petition filed by plaintiff sought a divorce from defendant, among other things, on the ground of “extreme cruelty”; that the journal entry of judgment as drawn and filed by the court in this case recites that “the plaintiff, Beulah H. Welch, is entitled to a divorce from the defendant, A. J. Welch, on the ground of ‘cruel treatment’ ”; that the words “extreme cruelty” and “cruel treatment” are not synonymous, and that the decree is therefore void.

Such- contention we think is wholly without merit.

The trial court in its order overruling plaintiff’s motion for new trial said:

“That plaintiff’s request to modify and correct the judgment and decree heretofore rendered herein on July 3, 1929, to show that plaintiff saved exceptions be, and the *287 same is, hereby allowed, and said judgment is hereby 'corrected to show that exceptions were taken by the plaintiff to all oí said judgment in so far as it applies to the division of the property between the parties, but not to the decree of divorce which, was rendered in plaintiff’s favor, upon her petition and evidence and at,her request upon the grounds of extreme cruelty, being the second ground of her petition, to which decree of divorce the plaintiff' did not and could not save exceptions.” (Emphasis ours.)

This order clearly recites that plaintiff, in the lower court, did not save exceptions to the decree of divorce rendered at her instance, in her favor, upon her petition, and upon the grounds of “extreme cruelty,” as specified in the second ground set out in her petition.

As a matter of law, plaintiff cannot now predicate error upon that which has been granted at her request, and to which she has saved no exceptions.

In Shirk v. McGinnis, 116 Okla. 93, 243 Pac. 214, the court said:

“To permit a suitor, upon whose motion and for whose benefit a judgment has been rendered, to reverse his position on appeal ahd repudiate the benefits of the judgment so rendered in his favor, would enable litigants to play fast and loose with the courts, as the varying whims and fortunes of such litigants should dictate.”

The order of the trial court overruling plaintiff’s motion for new trial clearly recognizes that the decree was rendered in plaintiff’s favor, upon the statutory ground of “extreme cruelty.” The contention urged herein by plaintiff that the decree is void because it recites that the divorce was granted plaintiff upon the ground of “cruel treatment” is a fallacious contention based on a mere play of words.

The appeal from the decree of divorce granted plaintiff at her request, upon the second ground of her petition, and plaintiff’s attempt on appeal to repudiate the decree rendered in her favor and at her instance, and having saved no exceptions in the lower court to the decree of clivorcément as prayed for, constitutes frivolity and such practice is not sanctioned by this court.

We hold the decree of divorce rendered herein to be a valid and binding decree.

2. The second contention of plaintiff is that the trial court abused its discretion in the division of defendant’s property.

The trial court’s decree, in so far as the findings and orders fixing the property rights of the parties are concerned, provides:

“The court further finds that the total net reasonable cash value of defendant’s real and personal property is $45,000. And that the defendant is entitled to pay plaintiff as alimony the sum of $22,500, the same to be paid to plaintiff at the first of each month in advance beginning with July, 1929, and the first of each month thereafter, said payments to be in the sum of $150 each month, anj said payments to bear interest at the rate of 0 per cent, after maturity or; the date upon which said payment is due, until said full amount of $22,500 has been paid. And the court further finds that this amount of $22,500 shall be a lien on lots 17 and 18, block 38, Clinton, Okla., to secure the payment of said amount, and that all of the other property of the said A. J. Welch shall be free from the lien of said judgment. The court further finds that the plaintiff is entitled to the household and kitchen furniture now located in the family residence on Ninth street in Clinton, Okla., and that the plaintiff is entitled to use and occupy the family residence until January 1, 1930. The court further finds that the plaintiff shall vacate the family residence by January 1, 1930, or as soon thereafter as the defendant buys or builds for her a residence to cost not less than $4,000 located in the city of Clinton, Okla., in a location suitable to plaintiff.

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Related

Vanderslice v. Vanderslice
1945 OK 188 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1945)
Harden v. Harden
1942 OK 229 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1942)
Welch v. Welch
1936 OK 311 (Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 1936)

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Bluebook (online)
1930 OK 485, 292 P. 824, 145 Okla. 286, 1930 Okla. LEXIS 222, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/welch-v-welch-okla-1930.