131 U.S.Append. CLXV, 24 L.Ed. 1109, 1879 U.S. LEXIS 1355, 1879 WL 16398 (U.S.N.Y.)

Supreme Court of the United States.

HUNT v. HUNT.

No. 705.

Jan. 6, 1879.

PRIOR HISTORY:   [*1]  

ERROR TO THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

MOTION TO DISMISS. The case is stated in the opinion.

COUNSEL:   Mr. Thomas J. Durant and Mr. C. W. Hornor for the motion. Mr. D. D. Lord opposing.

OPINION BY:   WAITE

OPINION:   MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WAITE delivered the opinion of the court.

The contract of marriage is not a contract within the meaning of the provision In the Constitution prohibiting States from impairing the obligation of contracts.

In the Dartmouth College Case, 4 Wheat. 629 [17 U.S. 518 at 629], it was expressly said by Chief Justice Marshall, in delivering the opinion of the court, that the provision of the Constitution prohibiting States from passing laws impairing the obligation of contracts “had never been understood to embrace other contracts than those which respect property, or some object of value, and confer rights which may be asserted in a court of justice. It never has been understood to restrict the general right of the legislature to legislate upon the subject of divorces. Those acts enable some tribunal, not to impair a marriage contract, but to liberate one of the parties because it has been broken by the other.” This disposes of the first ground  [*2]  upon which our jurisdiction is invoked in this case. The law complained of simply provides for divorces in certain cases after hearing by a court of competent jurisdiction.

The suit in Louisiana was one affecting the personal status of the defendant in error, a citizen of that State. The contract of marriage from which he sought to be liberated had been entered into in that State when both parties were citizens of the State. The question presented for decision below, and decided, was not what would be the rights of the plaintiff in error if she had been a citizen of the State of New York when the suit was commenced against her in Louisiana, but whether she was a citizen of New York. The court decided she was not. Such a decision of the state court does not present a question of which we have jurisdiction.

The motion to dismiss is granted.