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172 Misc. 204

Snyder v. Snyder

New York Supreme Court

Decided September 22, 1939

New York Supreme Court · decided 1939-09-22

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““As I see it, tbe abolition of the named causes of action does not entail the concomitant abolition of the cause of action for knowingly engaging in an unlawful marriage. And that is the basic burden of the present action. The complaint is that the plaintiff was induced to enter into a void marriage with the decedent in reliance on his willfully false representation that he was single and unmarried. The defendant argues that there would be no basis for the present action had there not been a promise of marriage by the decedent and a failure to keep such promise, and that therefore the plaintiff’s cause of action is based upon a breach of contract to marry. I do not go along with this contention. The plaintiff does not here assert that the decedent wronged her in failing to marry her; rather, she is asserting that decedent wronged her in fraudulently inducing her to marry him. The plaintiff’s complaint is based on what the decedent did, and not on what he refused to do.””

quoted by 1 later decision, including Morris v. MacNab

“Accordingly there has been no resort to the form of action in deceit as a subterfuge and attempt to circumvent the statutory prohibition.”

quoted by 1 later decision, including Ab v. Cd

Relies on 8 Ohio Op. 5 - Fearon v. Treanor · Blossom v. . Barrett

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1939-09-22

How this case has been cited

Cited by 11 later decisions — most recently March 1963

7 state decisions

601939194019501960decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

Hofstadter, J.

¶1The complaint is attacked for insufficiency and on the further ground that the cause of action alleged is prohibited by statute. The gist of the complaint is that the plaintiff was induced to enter into a void marriage with the defendant in reliance on his false representation that he was single and unmarried.

¶2In the absence of any statutory prohibition, it is settled that a woman has an action in deceit against a man for inducing a putative marriage by knowingly false representations when in fact he had no capacity to marry. (Blossom v. Barrett, 37 N. Y. 434.)

¶3The only question to be determined is whether article 2-A of the Civil Practice Act has abolished this type of action. It is clear that the alleged cause of action is not contrary to the expressed public policy of the State as set forth in the governing statute.

¶4*205In the final analysis the constitutional power to legislate with respect to actions for breach of promise of marriage rests in the inherent right of the Legislature to regulate the marriage relation itself, to the end that “ marriage should not be entered into because of the threat or danger of an action to recover money damages and the embarrassment and humiliation growing out of such an action.” (Fearon v. Treanor, 272 N. Y. 268, 274.)

¶5An action to recover damages because of a consummated bigamous marriage is not one which is subject to abuse or manipulation by unscrupulous persons. It is neither within the letter nor the intendment of the law.

¶6The gravamen of this complaint is the injury resulting from the change of status of the parties. In no conceivable aspect is the plaintiff seeking damages for any breach of promise to marry. Accordingly there has been no resort to the form of action in deceit as a subterfuge and attempt to circumvent the statutory prohibition.

¶7In the case of Sulkowski v. Szewczyk (255 App. Div. 103) the plaintiff merely accepted the proposal of marriage. The distinguishing factor here is that the marriage in fact was entered into and consummated.

¶8Motion is denied.

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