Not a Shifting Alimony Presumption, under Van Ardsdale v. Van Ardsdale
The crux of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court’s (SJC) recent Van Ardsdale v. Van Ardsdale, is that the retroactive effect of durational limits under the Alimony Reform Act (eff. 3.1.12) (ARA) is constitutional because the imposition of these constraints is “merely” presumptive and, therefore, do not “attach new legal consequences to events completed before its enactment”.
We do not question precedent. While its comparison of a sex offender’s right to contest registration requirement for adjudications that occurred before the registry legislation, in Doe, Sex Offender Registry Bd. 3839 v. Sex Offender Registry Bd., to alimony recipients’ right to seek deviation from the “presumed” durational limits is cringe-worthy, we get the analysis. Because the sex offender and the alimony payee both have some chance of eluding the impact of new legislation, the former by an appeal to the Board, and the latter by an “interests of justice” court deviation from alimony termination, the individual’s jeopardy is not foregone; therefore, it does not rise to the level of a “new legal consequence”.
Presumptions, the SJC reasons, are “simply rules of evidence”.
But, sometimes good legal analysis defies reality, or at least practicality.
Before ARA, the burden of proving changed circumstances to justify the termination of alimony sat squarely on the shoulders of the payor. Retirement? Just one circumstance to consider. Income loss? Well, maybe, but just how did that happen, anyway. Cohabitation of the recipient? Forgettaboutit.
Now, the burden falls just as squarely the recipient, as the secondary holding Van Ardsdale, and the same day’s Popp v. Popp, demonstrate. It is a small sample to be sure, but the appellate scoreboard on reported cases for alimony payees seeking to extend alimony beyond “presumed” time limits is 0-2. In many cases, the answer will be the same for recipients as it used to be for obligors whose alimony check supported the household of not only the ex- spouse, but a new “friend” as well.
We are not at all criticizing that this burden shift has occurred. That is a policy question, and one properly reserved to the legislature. The old alimony system was, in many respects, out of control.
But, calling a major burden shift as a mere rule of evidence trivializes a very real and substantive change in our statutory law. And, it denies the everyday experience of litigants and their counsel, many of whom will not sue for alimony extensions, because presumptions are meant to be hard to overcome. And, expensive. And, risky.
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