Cronebaugh v. Van DykeCronebaugh v. Van Dyke
Appellant, the former wife, sued appellee, her former husband, for alleged arrearages in child support. The trial court entered summary judgment for the father and dismissed the cause, ruling the mother did not have standing to enforce the alleged arrearage because, at the time the child support payments were supposedly not paid, the “children” were over eighteen years of age and able to sue in their own right. We affirm.
The parties were divorced in 1964. The dissolution decree incorporated an agreement which provided that the father would pay child support for the parties’ three children in the mother‘s custody until each child attained majority, died, married or became self-supporting. The final decree also provided that the father would pay the costs and expenses incurred by each child in attending a college or university.
The appellee father paid to the appellant custodial mother the stipulated child support for each child until the particular child reached 18 years of age and even thereafter until the particular child moved away from the mother‘s home and into his own apartment or fraternity house in Sеptember following his 18th birthday.1 Thereafter the father paid the required support amount and costs and expenses of college directly to the child. The mother waited until after the two oldest children had each received directly from their father “monies far in excess” of the father‘s formally adjudicated support obligation and were both over 21 years of age; then the mother sued the father for the amount оf support due under the support judgment for the three years she did not receive the support payments, saying that by the terms of the final judgment her right to receive the child support accruing after the child was 18 years of age was vested in her. The father maintained that he had satisfied his obligation by his payments directly to the children, rather than through their mother. The mother moved for summary judgment, admitting the father had paid the support directly to each child, but asserting that the support obligation was due her. The father filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings or alternatively a motion to dismiss for failure to state a cause of action, arguing that, with regard to support obligations admittedly due a “child” between the ages of 18 and 21, enforcement rests with the child and therefore the mother did not have standing to sue. On these facts and procedural setting thе trial court granted summary judgment for the father.2
The trial court‘s order can be affirmed on either of two grounds. First, the trial court correctly determined that the wife lacks standing to enforce any support
The same event that removes the child‘s disability — its arrival at the age of majority — is usually the same event that terminates the parents’ duty to support. Hence, the problem of an emancipated child suing his or her parent for nonsupport would normally never arise. However, the enactment of
Provisions in dissolution settlement agreements relating to payment of child support, even when incorporated by reference in final judgments, serve only to formalize and document the promisor‘s pre-existing legal duty of support, to state the frequency and amount of periodic payments, theretofore unliquidated, which at that time the relevant parties agree will discharge the promisor‘s support duty and to recognize who is to receive the support on behalf of the minor. The recipient receives the sums as trustee for the children. That such agreements are not the basis for the right to child support is demonstrated by the fact that they are subject to modification by the court as to these provisions.9 If support orders, whether based on settlement agreements or not, were personal to the minor‘s custodian, who is the usual recipient, the obligation would not survive the death of the designated payee and this is not true. The trustee nature of the recipient of child support is also illustrated by the last sentence in
To the extent that in an agreement a parent may, as here, agree to pay sums for the benefit of a child which are in excess of the duty imposed by law, such as the cost of higher education, the child, who is a third party donee beneficiary of any such executory contract, has a vested pecuniary interest in performance. In cases of this sort, as in contract law generally, it is the beneficiary, not the promisee, who is entitled to performance and who, subject to defenses and conditions, has a cause of action against the promisor and who is entitled to receive the performance which discharges the obligation.10 Since child support is truly a right of the child and can be enforced by the child once he or she turns eighteen, the wife in the present case does not have standing to sue.11
In relying on Kern v. Kern, 360 So.2d 482 (Fla. 4th DCA 1978), the trial court relied on the following passage:
The award of child support, although made to the mother as the child‘s natural guardian, is solely for the benefit of the child, who, because of the disability of non-age, lacks the legal status to bring suit directly against his parent for support. Under Florida law, when a child reaches eighteen years of age, this disability of non-age is removed, and if an obligation of support exists, the child may proceed in his own right in a cоurt of competent jurisdiction to establish such obligation. See Rudnick v. Solomon, 311 So.2d 385 (Fla. 3d DCA 1975). The parent who formerly had legal custody of the child has no pecuniary interest in such litigation. Thus, once a normal child reaches majority, a parent has no standing to seek support money for that child in the courts of this state. 360 So.2d at 485.
This appears to be a good and applicable statement of law. A person who has reached the age of 18 сan no longer accurately be called a child. Instead, he or she is a young adult who can remove himself from the custody of his mother. Although the supreme court has interpreted agreements to pay support until majority to mean until 21,12 once the child reaches 18 he can enforce this support obligation himself.
Notwithstanding the standing issue, the trial court‘s summary judgment can be affirmed on the issue of payment. In this case thеre is no issue but that the father had paid the sums due after the children reached 18 years of age directly to the children when they moved away from home.13 This payment satisfied and discharged the father‘s duty. This was sufficient alone to justify the summary judgment entered by the trial court. However, realizing that the children were not parties to the cause, the able trial judge carefully provided that the dismissal of the mother‘s cause was “without рrejudice to the recipient of the obligation to seek enforcement in a separate action.”
The trial court was correct in granting the father‘s motion for summary judgment and the order is hereby
AFFIRMED.
FRANK D. UPCHURCH, Jr., J., concurs specially with opinion.
SHARP, J., dissents with opinion.
I do not interpret the majority opinion as limiting in any way the right of parties to contract in a dissolution agreement or to prohibit the enforcement of the agreement upon its breach. In this case, support wаs payable until the children reached “majority.” However, the age of majority was changed after execution of the agreement. While the obligation of support which arose pursuant to the agreement was to continue until the affected children reached twenty-one years, Daugherty v. Daugherty, 308 So.2d 24 (Fla. 1975), the children were no longer minors and had acquired all the rights and privileges of adults. As adults, they themselves could contract, give acquitances, sue in their own right and live where they wished. Conversely, the “custodial” parent had no further legal duty to the newly emancipated children, although the parent may have voluntarily continued to support or maintain a home for the individual.
While I concede that a custodial parent may make financial commitments for the benefit of his or her children, such as car or house payments, and should be allоwed to do so as suggested by the dissent, I disagree that the majority opinion obliterates this right. The only requirement is that such eventuality be anticipated in the dissolution agreement. In the event that it is anticipated, I see no obstacle to its enforcement created by the majority opinion.
SHARP, Judge, dissenting.
I dissent in this case because under principles established by the Florida courts to handle “limbo” dissolution decrees1 (like the one invоlved in this case), the custodial parent still should have standing to enforce the child support obligation, even though the children have attained eighteen years of age.
These parties were divorced in 1964. The final judgment (allegedly based on an agreement by the parties) entered by Judge W. Troy Hall, Jr. provided:
7. The Defendant shall pay to the plaintiff as child support for the three children ... the sum of $125.00 per month2 for each child who is living with the Plaintiff and who is a minor. Such child support payments shall continue even though the child is away from the home of the Plaintiff temporarily such as at camp, school or vacation. ... (Emphasis supplied).
* * * * * *
10. The Defendant shall pay the costs and expenses incurred by each child in attending a college or university.
In 1980, the former wife and mother brought suit to collect arrearages in child support due for the two older boys, Rufus and Kеith, who at the time of this litigation were over twenty-one years of age. She alleged by verified pleadings that she had not received the bulk of the child support payments which accrued while they were between eighteen and twenty-one years of age — some eight thousand dollars ($8,000).3 The appellee (Rufus Van Dyke) asserted three affirmative defenses4 in his pleadings and deposition based on his claim that he had рaid the full amount of the child support directly to the respective children after they went to college and lived (during the school year) in their fraternity houses and apartments, and that this course of action was taken by him with his former wife‘s knowledge and acquiescence. In her verified reply, the appellant, Mrs. Cronebaugh, alleged she had made repeated demands for payment and had not agreed to this аrrangement.
If a child support obligation can be fully discharged by payment to a person not specified in the dissolution judgment, that makes it, for all practical purposes, unenforceable by the former spоuse. Note number 11 of the majority opinion ignores the realities of its decision. Whether or not the payments were made, whether required by a judgment or an agreement, the former spouse will not be able to enforce them because this opinion holds she lacks standing to sue. Further, the majority ignores the realities that a former spouse often has made financial commitments for the benefit of her children, such as car payments and house payments, which I think she should be allowed to do.7 The majority opinion obliterates this right.8
The effect of this decision is to modify retroactively, the “limbo” dissolution decrees, which I think, is contrary to Florida law. It is well established that separation agreements and dissolution judgments effective before July 1, 1973, which require child support payments until a child is twenty-one or until he attains his “majority” are enforceable until the child reaches the age оf twenty-one (21).
The lower court relied upon Kern v. Kern, 360 So.2d 482 (Fla. 4th DCA 1978). I agree with Holmes v. Holmes, 384 So.2d 1295,
The trial court‘s reliance on Kern v. Kern, supra, was misplaced. There the wife had filed for modification of the child support provisions of a final judgment of dissolution of marriage, seeking to require the husband to provide for the college education of the adult children of the parties where there had been no agreement to do so and the final judgment did [not] so provide. The district court there held that absent an agreement, a divorce court had no jurisdiction to require a parent to furnish an adult child with support in the form of a college education. In a foоtnote to that holding, the court emphasized: ‘Nothing in this opinion should be construed as limiting the power of a court to enforce a stipulated to agreement between the parties in a dissolution proceeding.’ 360 So.2d at 486, n. 6. (Emphasis supplied).
In this case, the agreement between the parties contemplated the former husband would pay child support to the wife while the children were in college,9 until they reached twenty-one (21) years of age, or became emancipated in other ways not applicable. Prior to 1973 the former wife had standing to enforce that obligation and receive the payments because she was the custodial parent of the non-emancipated children, and because she was a party to the agreement which is the source of Van Dyke‘s obligations. Neither her right to enforce nor Van Dyke‘s obligаtion to pay should be affected by
Notes
Upon consideration it is ORDERED that: It aрpearing that all claims for past due support accrued subsequent to the child obtaining majority age, the legal right to enforce such obligation rests with the child, not with the mother.
Summary Judgment is GRANTED and cause is DISMISSED, without prejudice to the recipient of the obligation to seek enforcement in a separate action.
See: Kern v. Kern, 360 So.2d 482 (4 DCA — 1978).
DONE AND ORDERED in Chambers at Orlando, Florida, this 8th day of September, 1980.
The judgment was later amended to increase this amount to $150.00 per month per child.But we nеed not get to that issue today. The issue today is on the motion on Judgment on the Pleadings as I have raised it and is whether or not Mrs. Cronebaugh has any standing in this court to bring this action. The legal proposition that I am citing the court is that once an individual attained the age of 18, there may be a legal duty of support to that individual imposed by previous court order but it is to that individual and not to his mother once he has reached the аge of 18 and she is no longer guardian and no longer has a proprietor‘s interest in the support payments due him.