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Maynard v. Hill | 125 U.S. 190 (1888)

The Contracts Clause of Article One of the Constitution prohibits state legislatures from passing laws that impair private contractual obligations. But does that prohibition apply to marriage contracts? The Court explored that territory in the 1888 case of Maynard versus Hill.

In 1850, Congress passed the Donation Land Claim Act to encourage settlement in the Oregon Territory. Under the act, an adult man would receive 320 acres of land in the territory if he occupied and cultivated the land for four years. Married couples would receive 640 acres, granted to the husband and wife in equal shares.

One of the settlers who decided to take advantage of the land-claim act was David Maynard. David lived in Ohio with his wife, Lydia, and their two children. But in 1850, David abandoned his family to head West. He promised to send for Lydia and the children within two years and to send support in the meantime, but he never did.

In April of 1852, David claimed a 640-acre tract of land in Oregon Territory as a married man pursuant to the land-claim act. In December of that year, however, the territory’s legislative assembly passed an act at David’s request purporting to dissolve David and Lydia’s marriage. The following month, David married a woman he’d met on the Oregon Trail.

In April of 1856, David informed the territory’s land office that he’d occupied his land for four years. The land office issued David and his new wife, Catherine, a certificate for the land, giving them each 320 acres. But after proceedings to determine whether the property rightfully belonged to Catherine or to Lydia, the land-office commissioner ultimately concluded that neither woman was entitled to the property. He said that the divorce defeated Lydia’s interest in the property, and that Catherine hadn’t satisfied the land-claim act’s requirements. The 320 acres thus became public land, and it was acquired by Mr. Hill and Mr. Lewis.

Lydia died in 1879. David and Lydia’s children brought an action against Hill and Lewis seeking equitable conveyance of the property. They argued, among other things, that David and Lydia’s divorce was invalid because the legislation dissolving the marriage was prohibited by the Contracts Clause and a similar provision in the law establishing the Oregon Territory. The court dismissed the complaint, and the territory’s supreme court affirmed. The children sought review in the United States Supreme Court.

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