Can a husband be imprisoned for failing to pay his estranged wife's alimony payments?

California, United States of America


The following excerpt is from Bradley v. Superior Court In and For City and County of San Francisco, 310 P.2d 634, 48 Cal.2d 509 (Cal. 1957):

[48 Cal.2d 518] Petitioner further contends that to imprison him for failure to make payments to Frances under the property settlement agreement here involved would violate the provisions of the state Constitution forbidding imprisonment for debt. (Cal.Const., art. I, 15. 3) This contention is sound. In the California action it was specifically and finally determined, as between the parties, that the payments here involved are 'an inseverable part of an integrated adjustment of all property relations of the parties and not * * * a severable provision for alimony,' and that therefore section 139 of the Civil Code did not apply so as to terminate, upon the remarriage of Frances, petitioner's obligation to make such payments. (Lane v. Bradley (1954), supra, 124 Cal.App.2d 661, 666-667, 268 P.2d 1092.) And as already mentioned herein, the property settlement agreement itself declares that it 'is intended

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