Holland v. Holland

Hammond, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. The appellant seeks reversal of an order dismissing, on demurrer without leave to amend, his bill for annulment of his marriage on the ground of the fraudulent concealment before the marriage of the earlier insanity of his wife. The bill alleges the marriage in Harford County in December, 1957, and that the wife was then lucid; that from the middle of June until the middle of August, 1956, she had been confined in a hospital in Hagerstown for treatment on the diagnosis that she was a schizophrenic paranoid, and was removed from the hospital by her parents against the advice of the physicians treating her, and thereafter refused to take further treatment as she had been advised to do; that during the courtship and a short interim of married life, the wife “appeared for all intents and purposes to react normally to everyday occurrences” and that during this period “the respondent fraudulently concealed her prior commitment as a schizophrenic paranoid and so conspired with her family to conceal said condition and confinement from your complainant”; that the husband had no knowledge of the facts until, “a short time after marriage”, the wife became “dangerously ⁴⁵¹ violent as a result of her condition as a schizophrenic paranoid” and attempted to kill her husband and his mother, and that he has not since cohabited with her; and that no children were born as a result of the marriage. There are considered to be two main lines of decision on whether misrepresentation as to or concealment of insanity prior to marriage is fraud which will justify an annulment.

Most States have been slow to find concealment of prior insanity a sufficient ground for dissolution of the marital status, some classing it as in the category of misrepresentation as to social status, fame, fortune, temperament or disposition, and so as not going to the essence of the contract, although the decisions often turn actually on absence of fraud on the facts or ratification by cohabitation after knowledge of the facts. Other States, including New York, California and New Hampshire, 1 take the position that the concealment of past insanity or a diseased mental condition may be such fraud as goes to the essence of the matter and may be ground for annulment. Cases both ways are collected in 39 A.L.R. 1345 . See also 55 C.J.S.,, Marriage, § 34 (e), p. 872.

Generally in the States which recognize that concealment of prior insanity may constitute actionable fraud, the outcome depends on the facts—whether there was knowledge on the part of the afflicted spouse of the actual condition and its seriousness, and an intent to deceive, and no ratification by the innocent spouse after the facts are learned. 3 Nelson, Divorce and Annulment, Sec. 31.36, p. 318, would seem to sum up accurately in saying: “The solution of the question as to whether a marriage may be annulled by reason of the concealment or misrepresentation of the fact that one of ⁴⁵² the parties had been insane at sometime prior to the marriage will depend, it seems, upon the facts of the particular case.” This Court has given indications that when the question was presented for decision, Maryland would follow the minority view. The rule in this State has long been that a marriage procured through fraud may be avoided in the exercise of the inherent power of a court of equity to reform and rescind contracts. Le Brun v. Le Brun, 55 Md. 496, 502 ; Ridgely v. Ridgely, 79 Md. 298, 307 . The holding of those cases was reaffirmed in Brown v. Scott, 140 Md. 258, 268 , which annulled a marriage induced by fraudulent misrepresentation of a professional swindler.

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