Whitehead v. Whitehead

DISSENTING OPINION OF

LEVINSON, J.

I dissent.

I believe that HRS § 580-1,1 which establishes a one-year residence requirement as a jurisdictional prerequisite to the granting of an absolute divorce, is unconstitutional under both the Federal and State Constitutions for the following two reasons: (1) The statute deprives persons, residents in Hawaii for less than one year, of due process of law by denying them access to the only forum capable of granting them a hearing and relief on their claimed right to a dissolution of their marriages. (2) The one-year residence requirement bears no reasonable…