Facts: Petitioner Lou Fisch and respondent Nannie Marler countersued each other in the Superior Court for Pierce County subsequent to Fisch’s refusal to pay Marler alimony after her remarriage. Fisch brought an action to set aside the divorce decree dissolving his marriage to Marler on grounds that the marriage had been void while Marler brought an action to garnish Fisch’s wages in order to enforce her claim for unpaid alimony. The trial court consolidated the actions and dismissed both, ruling that Fisch had failed to support his allegations that the couple’s marriage had been void due to bigamy on the part of his wife and that Marler was not entitled to garnishment of Fisch’s wages as those wages were the community property of Fisch and his current wife. Both parties appealed this decision to the Supreme Court of Washington.

Question(s): Was the divorce decree and therefore the subsequent alimony judgment invalid insofar as the marriage between Fisch and Marler had been void due to Marler’s failure to formally divorce her first husband?

If not, was Marler entitled to garnishment of Fisch’s wages to enforce the alimony judgment?

Conclusion: Justice Steinert’s opinion for a unanimous Court ruled that, as the legal presumption is in favor of the validity of a marriage, Fisch had not met the burden of proof required to demonstrate that Marler’s first marriage had not been dissolved by the disappearance and presumed death of her first husband. The Court also held that Marler’s remarriage after her divorce from Fisch did not relieve him of his alimony obligations and that Fisch’s own remarriage did not protect his wages from garnishment to fulfill his obligations to Marler.

Docket No. 27648

Petitioner: Lou Fisch

Respondent: Nannie Marler

Decided: Wednesday, December 13th, 1939

Vote: 5-0

Opinion: 1 Wash. 698 (1939)

Court: Blake1 Court (1939-1940)

Blake

Main

Beals

Millard

Steinert

Geraghty

Robinson

Simpson

Jeffers