Schroeder v. Schroeder

Marbury, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. Once again this term we are asked to construe an agreement between the parties to a divorce action to determine whether the payments set forth therein were in the nature of alimony and thus within the power of the equity court to modify. The divorce decree did not expressly refer to the agreement, but an amount equal to that provided for in the agreement was decreed to be paid the wife as alimony. The appellant petitioned the court to modify the payments on the ground that the financial condition of the parties had changed, but the chancellor dismissed the petition with prejudice since he was of the opinion the payments were not alimony.

The agreement provided for a periodic payment of $25 per week, payable until the wife died or remarried and stated that it is “permanent alimony, subject ⁴⁶⁴ to the further Order of the Court,” the wife further releasing the husband from any and all other claims which might otherwise be asserted for alimony or support. The chancellor apparently accepted the position taken by the appellee, namely, that notwithstanding the recitation that the payments were alimony subject to court modification, since there was no specific mention that payments were to continue only during the joint lives of the parties, they were not alimony. The principle that payments must cease at the death of either party to constitute alimony reaches as far back as Wallingsford v. Walingsford, 6 H. & J. 485 , and has been reiterated innumerable times in our decisions through the years, In the recently decided case of Stevens v. Stevens, 233 Md. 279 , 196 A. 2d 447 , there was a similar provision in an agreement incorporated in a divorce decree that payments were to be made only so long as the