Dolliver v. Dolliver

California Supreme Court Jun 4, 1892 No. No. 13140Published

Before: Harrison

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Holding. A contract between spouses may be rescinded when one party uses the confidential marital relationship, combined with undue influence or coercion, to obtain an unfair advantage over the other.

Issues

Whether a contract between spouses can be rescinded due to fraud or undue influence.
Whether a husband's use of a divorce suit to coerce a property settlement constitutes undue influence.
Whether a wife is entitled to follow the proceeds of her property into assets purchased by the husband after he wrongfully obtained her assets.

Disposition. affirmed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“An action for the rescission of a contract may be maintained whenever the consent of the party seeking to rescind was obtained through any fraud or undue influence of the other party.”

Synopsis

Appeal — Findings — Support of Judgment.—Upon an appeal from a judgment taken upon the judgment roll alone, if the judgment is supported by the findings which are made, the failure of the court to make findings upon other issues presented by the pleadings is not a ground for reversal, unless it shall appear from the record that evidence was offered upon such issues in the trial court, and that a finding thereon from such evidence would countervail the findings actually made to such an extent as to invalidate the judgment. Nor does the fact that the court has made findings of fact which are not within the issues presented by the pleadings invalidate its judgment, if the judgment finds support in the findings which are within the issues, independent of such extraneous findings.

Rescission of Contract — Settlement by Wife upon Husband — Want of Consideration — Undue Influence — Absence of Advice. — Where it properly appears from the pleadings and findings in an action to rescind a contract that the parties to the contract were husband and wife; that the plaintiff at the time of her marriage was the owner of certain real estate as her separate property; that the defendant afterward abandoned the plaintiff, who was suffering from nervous prostration, and on the evening of the day of his desertion, after leaving her, caused her to be served at her residence with a summons and copy of a complaint in a suit for divorce, brought by him against her; that the parties thereafter executed the contract sought to he set aside, by which the wife agreed to transfer a part of her property to him; that the transfer was executed without any pecuniary advantage to the wife, hut that the husband received great pecuniary advantage therefrom, and the consideration recited therein was untrue; that the suit for divorce had been brought by him as a means of coercing her into a surrender of part of her separate property> and for no other reason, and had the effect to aggravate her bodily infirmity; that she was constrained to execute the instrument by reason of the moral pressure exerted upon her by the consideration of the effect upon her that would be produced by the prosecution of the suit; and that she had no independent advice concerning the legal effect and operation of the instrument, — a judgment that the defendant surrender to the plaintiff all the fruits of the contract, and that it he rescinded, will be affirmed.

Id.—Trust Relation of Husband and Wife — Effect of Action for Divorce — Degree of Confidence. —The relation of husband and wife creates a personal trust and confidence between them, which imposes upon each of the spouses the obligation of exercising the highest good faith towards the other in any dealings between them, and precludes either one of them from obtaining any advantage over the other by means of any misrepresentation, concealment, or adverse pressure; and this relation and the obligation arising from it are not destroyed by the mere fact that an action for a divorce is pending between them, nor does the law permit any inquiry into the extent of the trust and confidence presumed to be placed by one in the other so long as the relation exists.

Harrison, J. Action for the rescission of a contract. The court helow rendered judgment in favor of the plaintiff, and the defendant has appealed from the judgment, bringing the case here upon the judgment roll alone.

The court finds that the parties are husband and wife, having been married in 1873, and that the plaintiff, at the time of their marriage, was the owner of certain real estate as her separate property, at that time of the value of one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, and that after her marriage with the defendant she acquired certain other property, which was also her separate estate. On the 27th of August, 1885, the defendant abandoned the plaintiff, and thereafter ceased to live with her, and on the evening of that day, after leaving her, he caused her to be served at her residence with a sum[644]mons and copy of a complaint in a suit for divorce, brought by him against her. The court finds that at that time, and for some time previously, the plaintiff was a sufferer from general nervous prostration, and that the abandonment by the defendant, and the nature of the charges in the complaint for divorce, caused her great agitation and distress of mind, and greatly aggravated her bodily infirmity; and that while so distressed in mind and sick in bod}', she almost immediately sought out the defendant and urged him to dismiss the suit and return to her; and that on the 31st of August they met by appointment at the office of Mr. A. N. Drown, who was his attorney, and to whom he introduced the plaintiff, with the statement that they had come to make a settlement. At that interview certain memoranda of the settlement were prepared by Mr. Drown in the presence of both parties, and signed by them, and on the next day formal instruments of settlement, wdiich in the mean time had been prepared by his attorney, were executed by them.

By these instruments, the plaintiff made to the defendant her promissory notes, amounting to thirty thousand dollars, and secured their payment by a mortgage upon certain of her real estate, and a memorandum of agreement was signed by both parties, reciting that “ all of the property belonging to both of said parties has hitherto been and is now held by Mary W. Dolliver,” and that “ differences have arisen between said parties relating to such property, and the respective rights of each concerning the same,” and that “in mutual consideration of the premises,” it was agreed by them that the property that day conveyed by him to her should be her separate property, and that the property transferred by her to him, together with the aforesaid promissory notes and mortgage, should be his separate property. It is for the rescission of these agreements, and the restitution of the plaintiff to the property so conveyed, and the surrender of the notes and mortgage, that this action was brought.

Dolliver v. Dolliver

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