Hilliard v. Hilliard

PBESIDING JUSTICE DEMPSEY

delivered the opinion of the court.

This appeal is from a decree for divorce obtained by the husband several years after a decree for separate maintenance had been granted his wife. The question presented is: may a spouse who has been guilty of desertion for more than one year, and whose sincere attempts thereafter to effect a reconciliation have been repulsed, obtain a divorce upon the theory that the refusal of the other spouse to resume marital relations constitutes desertion?

The parties were married in 1931 and lived together until 1947. In October 1952, a separate…