Sherrer v. Sherrer

We granted certiorari in this case and in Coe v. Coe, 334 U.S. 378, 68 S.Ct. 1094, to consider the contention of petitioners that Massachusetts has failed to accord full faith and credit to decrees of divorce rendered by courts of sister States.1

Petitioner Margaret E. Sherrer and the respondent, Edward C. Sherrer, were married in New Jersey in 1930, and from 1932 until April 3, 1944, lived together in Monterey, Massachusetts. Following a long period of marital discord, petitioner, accompanied by the two children of the marriage, left Massachusetts on the latter date, ostensibly for the purpose of spending a vacation in the State of Florida. Shortly after her arrival in Florida, however, petitioner informed her husband that she did not intend to return to him. Petitioner obtained housing accommodations in Florida, placed her older child in school, and secured employment for herself.

On July 6, 1944, a bill of complaint for divorce was filed at petitioner's direction in the Circuit Court of the Sixth Judicial Circuit of the State of Florida.2 The bill alleged extreme cruelty as grounds for divorce and also alleged that petitioner was a 'bona fide resident of the State of Florida.'3 The respondentr eceived notice by mail of the pendency of the divorce proceedings. He retained Florida counsel who entered a general appearance and filed an answer denying the allegations of petitioner's complaint, including the allegation as to petitioner's Florida residence.4

On November 14, 1944, hearings were held in the divorce proceedings. Respondent appeared personally to testify with respect to a stipulation entered into by the parties relating to the custody of the children.5 Throughout the entire proceedings respondent was represented by counsel.6 Petitioner introduced evidence to establish her Florida residence and testified generally to the allegations of her complaint. Counsel for respondent failed to cross-examine or to introduce evidence in rebuttal.

The Florida court on November 29, 1944, entered a decree of divorce after specifically finding 'that petitioner is a bona fide resident of the State of Florida, and that this court has jurisdiction of the parties and the subject matter in said cause; * * *' Respondent failed to challenge the decree by appeal to the Florida Supreme Court.7

On December 1, 1944, petitioner was married in Florida to one Henry A. Phelps, whom petitioner had known while both were residing in Massachusetts and wno had come to Florida shortly after petitioner's arrival in that State. Phelps and petitioner lived together as husband and wife in Florida, where they were both employed, until February 5, 1945, when they returned to Massachusetts.

In June, 1945, respondent instituted an action in the Probate Court of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, which has given rise to the issues of this case. Respondent alleged that he is the lawful husband of petitioner, that the Florida decree of divorce is invalid, and that petitioner's subsequent marriage is void. Respondet prayed that he might be permitted to convey his real estate as if he were sole and that the court declare that he was living apart from his wife for justifiable cause.8 Petitioner joined issue on respondent's allegations.

In the proceedings which followed, petitioner gave testimony in defense of the validity of the Florida divorce decree.9 The Probate Court, however, resolved the issues of fact adversely to petitioner's contentions, found that she was never domiciled in Florida, and granted respondent the relief he had requested. The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts affirmed the decree on the grounds that it was supported by the evidence and that the requirements of full faith and credit did not preclude the Massachusetts courts from reexamining the finding of domicile made by the Florida court.10

At the outset, it should be observed that the proceedings in the Florida court prior to the entry of the decree of divorce were in no way inconsistent with the requirements of procedural due process. We do not understand respondent to urge the contrary. The respondent personally appeared in the Florida proceedings. Though his attorney he filed pleadings denying the substantial allegations of petitioner's complaint. It is not suggested that his rights to introduce evidence and otherwise to conduct his defense were in any degree impaired; nor is it suggested that there was not available to him the right to seek review of the decree by appeal to the Florida Supreme Court. It is clear that respondent was afforded his day in court with respect to every issue involved in the litigation, including the jurisdictional issue of petitioner's domicile. Under such circumstances, there is nothing in the concept of due process which demands that a defendant be afforded a second opportunity to litigate the existence of jurisdictional facts. Chicago Life Insurance Co. v. Cherry, 1917, 244 U.S. 25, 37 S.Ct. 492, 61 L.Ed. 966; Baldwin v. Iowa State Traveling Men's Association, 1931, 283 U.S. 522, 51 S.Ct. 517, 75 L.Ed. 1244.

It should also be observed that there has been no suggestion that under the law of Florida, the decree of divorce in question is in any respect invalid or could successfully be subjected to the type of attack permitted by the Massachusetts court. The implicit assumption underlying the position taken by respondent and the Massachusetts court is that this case involves a decree of divorce valid and final in the State which rendered it; and we so assume.11

That the jurisdiction of the Florida court to enter a valid decree of divorce was dependent upon petitioner's domicile in that State is not disputed.12 This requirement was recognized by the Florida court which rendered the divorce decree, and the principle has been given frequent application in decisions of the State Supreme Court.13 But whether or not petitioner was domiciled in Florida at the time the divorce was granted was a matter to be resolved by judicial determination. Here, unlike the situation presented in Williams v. North Carolina, 1945, 325 U.S. 226, 65 S.Ct. 1092, 89 L.Ed. 1577, 157 A.L.R. 1366, the finding of the requisite jurisdictional facts was made in proceedings in which the defendant appeared and participated. The question with which we are confronted, therefore, is whether such a finding made under the circumstances presented by this case may, consistent with the requirements of full faith and credit, be subjected to collateral attack in the courts of a sister State in a suit brought by the defendant in the original proceedings.

The question of what effect is to be given to an adjudication by a court that it possesses requisite jurisdiction in a case, where the judgment of that court is subsequently subjected to collateral attack on jurisdictional grounds, has been given frequent consideration by this Court over a period of many years. Insofar as cases originating in the federal courts are concerned, the rule has evolved that the doctrine of res judicata applies to adjudications relating either to jurisdiction of the person or of the subject matter where such adjudications have been made in proceedings in which those questions were in issue and in which the parties were given full opportunity to litigate.14 The reasons for this doctrine have frequently been stated. Thus in Stoll v. Gottlieb, 1938, 305 U.S. 165, 172, 59 S.Ct. 134, 138, it was said: 'Courts to determine the rights of parties are an integral part of our system of government. It is just as important that there should be a place to end as that there should be a place to begin litigation. After a party has his day in court, with opportunity to present his evidence and his view of the law, a collateral attack upon the decision as to jurisdiction there rendered merely retries the issue previously determined. There is no reason to expect that the second decision will be more satisfactory than the first.'

This Court has also held that the doctrine of res judicata must be applied to questions of jurisdiction in cases arising in state courts involving the application of the full faith and credit clause where, under the law of the state in which the original judgment was rendered, such adjudications are not susceptible to collateral attack.15

In Davis v. Davis, 1938, 305 U.S. 32, 59 S.Ct. 3, 83 L.Ed. 26, 118 A.L.R. 1518, the courts of the District of Columbia had refused to give effect to a decree of absolute divorce rendered in Virginia, on the ground that the Virginia court had lacked jurisdiction despite the fact that the defendant had appeared in the Virginia proceedings and had fully litigated the issue of the plaintiff's domicile. This Court held that in failing to give recognition to the Virginia decree, the courts of the District had failed to accord the full faith and credit required by the Constitution. During the course of the opinion, this Court stated: 'As to petitioner's domicil for divorce and his standing to invoke jurisdiction of the Virginia court, its finding that he was a bona fide resident of that State for the required time is binding upon respondent in the courts of the District. She may not say that he was not entitled to sue for divorce in the state court, for she appeared there and by plea put in issue his allegation as to domicil, introduced evidence to show it false, took exceptions to the commissioner's report, and sought to have the court sustain them and uphold her plea. Plainly, the determination of the decree upon that point is effective for all purposes in this litigation.'16

We believe that the decision of this Court in the Davis case and those in related situations17 are clearly indicative of the result to be reached here. Those cases stand for the proposition that the requirements of full faith and credit bar a defendant from collaterally attacking a divorce decree on jurisdictional grounds in the courts of a sister State where there has been participation by the defendant in the divorce proceedings, where the defendant has been accorded full opportunity to contest the jurisdictional issues, and where the decree is not susceptible to such collateral attack in the courts of the State which rendered the decree.18

Applying these principles to this case, we hold that the Massachusetts courts erred in permitting the Florida divorce decree to be subjected to attack on the ground that petitioner was not domiciled in Florida at the time the decree was entered. Respondent participated in the Florida proceedings by entering a general appearance, filing pleadings placing in issue the very matters he sought subsequently to contest in the Massachusetts courts, personally appearing before the Florida court and giving testimony in the case, and by retaining attorneys who represented him throughout the entire proceedings. It has not been contended that respondent was given less than a full opportunity to contest the issue of petitioner's domicile or any other issue relevant to the litigation. There is nothing to indicate that the Florida court would not have evaluated fairly and in good faith all relevant evidence submitted to it. Respondent does not even contend that on the basis of the evidence introduced in the Florida proceedings, that court reached an erroneous result on the issue of petitioner's domicile. If respondent failed to take advantage of the opportunities afforded him, the responsibility is his own. We do not believe that the dereliction of a defendant under such circumstances should be permitted to provide a basis for subsequent attack in the courts of a sister State on a decree valid in the State in which it was rendered.

It is suggested, however, that Andrews v. Andrews, 1903, 188 U.S. 14, 23 S.Ct. 237, 47 L.Ed. 366, militates against the result we have reached. In that case a husband, who had been domiciled in Ms sachusetts, instituted divorce proceedings in a South Dakota court after having satisfied the residence requirements of that State. The wife appeared by counsel and filed pleadings challenging the husband's South Dakota domicile. Before the decree of divorce was granted, however, the wife, pursuant to a consent agreement between the parties, withdrew her appearance from the proceedings. Following the entry of the decree, the husband returned to Massachusetts and subsequently remarried. After his death a contest developed between his first and second wives as to the administration of the husband's estate. The Massachusetts court concluded that the South Dakota decree of divorce was void on the ground that the husband had not been domiciled in that State and that under the applicable statutes of Massachusetts, the Massachusetts courts were not required to give recognition to such a decree. This Court affirmed on writ of error by a divided vote.19

On its facts, the Andrews case presents variations from the present situation.20 But insofar as the rule of that case may be said to be inconsistent with judgment herein announced, it must be regarded as having been superseded by subsequent decisions of this Court. The Andrews case was decided prior to the considerable modern development of the law with respect to finality of jurisdictional findings.21 One of the decisions upon which the majority of the Court in that case placed primary reliance, Wisconsin v. Pelican Insurance Co., 1888, 127 U.S. 265, 8 S.Ct. 1370, 32 L.Ed. 239, was, insofar as pertinent, overruled in Milwaukee County v. M. E. White Co., 1935, 296 U.S. 268, 56 S.Ct. 229, 80 L.Ed. 220. The Andrews case, therefore, may not be regarded as determinative of the issues before us.

It is urged further, however, that because we are dealing with litigation involving the dissolution of the marital relation, a different result is demanded from that which might properly be reached if this case were concerned with other types of litigation. It is pointed out that under the Constitution, the regulation and control of marital and family relationships are reserved to the States. It is urged, and properly so, that the regulation of the incidents of the marital relation involves the exercise by the States of powers of the most vital importance. Finally, it is contended that a recognition of the importance to the States of such powers demands that the requirements of full faith and credit be viewed in such a light as to permit an attack upon a divorce decree granted by a court of a sister State under the circumstances of this case even where the attack is initiated in a suit brought by the defendant in the original proceedings.22

But the recognition of the importance of a State's power to determine the incidents of basic social relationships into which its domiciliaries enter does not resolve the issues of this case. This is not a situation in which a State has merely sought to exert such power over a domiciliary. This is, rather, a case involving inconsistent assertions of power by courts of two States of the Federal Union and thus presents considerations which go beyond the interests of local policy, however vital. In resolving the issues here presented, we do not conceive it to be a part of our function to weigh the relative merits of the policies of Florida and Massachusetts with respect to divorce and related matters. Nor do we understand the decisions of this Court to support the proposition that the obligation imposed by Article IV, § 1 of the Constitution and the Act of Congress passed thereunde, amounts to something less than the duty to accord full faith and credit to decrees of divorce entered by courts of sister States.23 The full faith and credit clause is one of the provisions incorporated into the Constitution by its framers for the purpose of transforming an aggregation of independent, sovereign States into a nation.24 If in its application local policy must at times be required to give way, such 'is part of the price of our federal system.' Williams v. North Carolina, 1942, 317 U.S. 287, 302, 63 S.Ct. 207, 215.25

This is not to say that in no case may an area be recognized in which reasonable accommodations of interest may properly be made. But as this Court has heretofore made clear, that area is of limited extent.26 We believe that in permitting an attack on the Florida divorce decree which again put in issue petitioner's Florida domicile and in refusing to recognize the validity of that decree, the Massachusetts courts have asserted a power which cannot be reconciled with the requirements of due faith and credit. We believe that assurances that such a power will be exercised sparingly and wisely render it no less repugnant to the constitutional commands.

It is one thing to recognize as permissible the judicial reesamination of findings of jurisdictional fact where such findings have been made by a court of a sister State which has entered a divorce decree in ex parte proceedings.27 It is quite another thing to hold that the vital rights and interests involved in divorce litigation may be held in suspense pending the scrutiny by courts of sister States of findings of jurisdictional fact made by a competent court in proceedings conducted in a manner consistent with the highest requirements of due process and in which the defendant has participated. We do not conceive it to be in accord with the purposes of the full faith and credit requirement to hold that a judgment rendered under the circumstances of this case may be required to run the gantlet of such collateral attack in the courts of sister States before its validity outside of the State which rendered it is established or rejected. That vital interests are involved in divorce litigation indicates to us that it is a matter of greater rather than lesser importance that there should be a place to end such litigation.28 And where a decree of divorce is rendered by a competent court under the circumstances of this case, the obligation of full faith and credit requires that such litigation should end in the courts of the State in which the judgment was rendered.

Reversed.

Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER and Mr. Justice MURPHY dissenting. For dissenting opinion, see 334 U.S.3 43, 68 S.Ct. 1097.

What Mr. Justice Holmes said of the illstarred Haddock v. Haddock may equally be said here: 'I do not suppose that civilization will come to an end whichever way this case is decided.' 201 U.S. 562, 628, 26 S.Ct. 525, 551, 50 L.Ed. 867, 5 Ann.Cas. 1. But, believing as I do that the decision just announced is calculated, however unwittingly, to promote perjury without otherwise appreciably affecting the existing disharmonies among the forty-eight States in relation to divorce, I deem it appropriate to state my views.

Not only is today's decision fraught with the likelihood of untoward consequences. It disregards a law that for a century has expressed the social policy of Massachusetts, and latterly of other States, in a domain which under our Constitution is peculiarly the concern of the States and not of the Nation.

If all that were necessary in order to decide the validity in one State of a divorce granted in another was to read the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the Constitution, art. 4, § 1, generations of judges would not have found the problem so troublesome as they have, nor would a divided Court have successively pronounced a series of discordant decisions. 'Full faith and credit' must be given to a judgment of a sister State. But a 'judgment' implies the power of the State to deal with the subject-matter in controversy. A State court which has entered what professes to be a judgment must have had something on which to act. That something is what is conveyed by the word 'jurisdiction,' and, when it comes to dissolving a marriage status, throughout the English-speaking world the basis of power to act is domicile. Whether or not in a particular situation a person is domiciled in a given State depends on circumstances, and circumstances have myriad diversities. But there is a consensus of opinion among English-speaking courts the world over that domicile requires some sense of permanence of connection between the individual who claims it and the State which he asks to recognize it.

It would certainly have been easier if from the beginning the Full Faith and Credit Clause had been construed to mean that the assumption of jurisdiction by the courts of a State would be conclusive, so that every other State would have to respect it. But such certainly has not been the law since 1873. Thompson v. Whitman, 18 Wall. 457, 21 L.Ed. 897. Nor was it the law when this Court last considered the divorce problem, in 1945. Williams v. North Carolina, 325 U.S. 226, 65 S.Ct. 1092, 89 L.Ed. 1577, 157 A.L.R. 1366. A State that is asked to enforce the action of another State may appropriately ascertain whether that other State had power to do what it purported to do. And if the enforcing State has an interest under our Constitution in regard to the subject-matter that is vital and intimate, it should not be within the power of private parties to foreclose that interest by their private arrangement. Andrews v. Andrews, 188 U.S. 14, 23 S.Ct. 237, 47 L.Ed. 366; cf. Fall v. Eastin, 215 U.S. 1, 30 S.Ct. 3, 54 L.Ed. 65, 23 L.R.A.,N.S., 924, 17 Ann.Cas. 853; Alaska Packers Association v. Industrial Accident Commission, 294 U.S. 532, 55 S.Ct. 518, 79 L.Ed. 1044.

If the marriage contract were no different from a contract to sell an automobile, the parties thereto might well be permitted to bargain away all interests involved, in or out of court. But the State has an interest in the family relations of its citizens vastly different from the interest it has in an ordinary commercial transaction. That interest cannot be bartered or bargained away by the immediate parties to the controversy by a default or an arranged contest n a proceeding for divorce in a State to which the parties are strangers. Therefore, the constitutional power of a State to determine the marriage status of two of its citizens should not be deemed foreclosed by a proceeding between the parties in another State, even though in other types of controversy considerations making it desirable to put an end to litigation might foreclose the parties themselves from reopening the dispute.1 I cannot agree that the Constitution forbids a state from insisting that it is not bound by any such proceedings in a distant State wanting in the power that domicile alone gives, and that its courts need not honor such an intrinsically sham proceeding, no matter who brings the issue to their attention.

That society has a vital interest in the domestic relations of its members will be almost impatiently conceded.2 But it is not enough to pay lip-service to the commonplace as an abstraction. Its implications must be respected. They define our problems. Nowhere in the United States, not even in the States which grant divorces most freely, may a husband and wife rescind ther marriage at will as they might a commercial contract. Even if one thought that such a view of the institution of marriage was socially desirable, it could scarcely be held that such a personal view was incorporated into the Constitution or into the law for the enforcement of the Full Faith and Credit Clause enacted by the First Congress. 1 Stat. 122, 28 U.S.C. § 687, 28 U.S.C.A. § 687. That when the Constitution was ordained divorce was a matter of the deepest public concern, rather than deemed a personal dispute between private parties, is shown by the fact that it could be secured almost exclusively only by special enactments of the several legislatures and not through litigation in court. See Ireland and Galindez, Divorce in the Americas (1947) p. 1.

As a contract, the marriage contract is unique in the law. To assimilate it to an ordinary private contract can only mislead. See Maynard v. Hill, 125 U.S. 190, 210—214, 8 S.Ct. 723, 729—731, 31 L.Ed. 654; Restatement of the Law, Contracts, §§ 584, 586; cf. Trustees of Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 4 Wheat. 518, 627—629, 4 L.Ed. 629. The parties to a marriage do not comprehend between them all the interests that the relation contains. Society sanctions the institution and creates and enforces its benefits and duties. As a matter of law, society is represented by the permanent home State of the parties, in other words, that of their domicile. In these cases that State was Massachusetts.

Massachusetts has seen fit to subject its citizens to the following law:

'A divorce decreed in another jurisdiction according to the laws thero f by a court having jurisdiction of the cause and of both the parties shall be valid and effectual in this commonwealth; but if an inhabitant of this commonwealth goes into another jurisdiction to obtain a divorce for a cause occurring here while the parties resided here, or for a cause which would not authorize a divorce by the laws of this commonwealth, a divorce so obtained shall be of no force or effect in this commonwealth.' Mass.Gen.Laws, c. 208, § 39 (1932).

This statute, in substance,3 was first enacted in 1935, and even then merely formalized a prior rule of judicial origin. Cf. Hanover v. Turner, 14 Mass. 227, 7 Am.Dec. 203; Report of the Commissioners Appointed to Revise the General Statutes of the Commonwealth, pt. II, p. 123; 2 Kent, Commentaries, Lect. 27, *108 *109. The Uniform Annulment of Marriages and Divorce Act,4 passed by Delaware,5 New Jersey,6 and Wisconsin,7 is almost identical, as is a Maine statute8 on the same subject.

Massachusetts says through this statute that a peron who enjoys its other institutions but is irked by its laws concerning the severance of the marriage tie, must either move his home to some other State with more congenial laws, or remain and abide by the laws of Massachusetts. He cannot play ducks and drakes with the State, by leaving it just long enough to take advantage of a proceeding elsewhere, devised in the interests of a quick divorce, intending all the time to retain Massachusetts as his home, and then return there, resume taking advantage of such of its institutions as he finds congenial but assert his freedom from the restraints of its policies concerning severance of the marriage tie. Massachusetts has a right to define the terms on which it will grant divorces, and to refuse to recognize divorces granted by other States to parties who at the time are still Massachusetts domiciliaries. Has it not also the right to frustrate evasion of its policies by those of its permanent residents who leave the State to change their spouses rather than to change their homes, merely because they go through a lukewarm or feigned contest over jurisdiction?

The nub of the Williams decision was that the State of domicile has an independent interest in the martial status of its citizens that neither they nor any other State with which they may have a transitory connection may abrogate against its will. Its interest is not less because both parties to the marital relationship instead of one sought to evade its laws. In the Williams case, it was not the interest of Mrs. Williams, or that of Mr. Hendryx, that North Carolina asserted. It was the interest of the people of North Carolina. The same is true here of the interest of Massachusetts.9 While the State's interest may be expressed in criminal prosecutions, with itself formally a party as in the Williams case, the State also expresses its sovereign power when it speaks through its courts in a civil litigation between private parties. Cf. Shelley v. Kraemer, 334 U.S. 1, 68 S.Ct. 836.

Surely there is involved here an exercise by Massachusetts of its policy concerning the termination of marriage by its own citizens. The Framers left that power over domestic relations in the several States, and every effort to withdraw it from the States within the past sixty years has failed.10 An American citizen may change his domicile from one State to another. And so, a State must respect another State's valid divorce decree even though it concerns its former citizens. But the real question here is whether the Full Faith and Credit Clause can be used as a limitation on the power of a State over its citizens who do not change their domicile, who do not remove to another State, but who leave the State only long enough to escape the rigors of its laws, obtain a divorce, and then scurry back. To hold that this Massachusetts statute contravenes the Full Faith and Credit Clause is to say that that State has so slight a concern in the continuance or termination of the marital relationships of its domiciliaries that its interest may be foreclosed by an arranged litigation between the parties in which it was not represented.11

Today's decision may stir hope of contributing toward greater certainty of status of those divorced. But when people choose to avail themselves of laws laxer than those of the State in which they permanently abide, and where, barring only the interlude necessary to get a divorce, they choose to continue to abide, doubts and conflicts are inevitable, so long as the divorce laws of the forty-eight States remain diverse, and so long as we respect the law that a judgment without jurisdictional foundation is not constitutionally entitled to recognition everywhere. These are difficulties, as this Court has often reminded, inherent in our federal system, in which governmental power over domestic relations is not given to the central government. Uniformity regarding divorce is not within the power of this Court to achieve so long as 'the domestic relations of husband and wife * * * were matters reserved to the States.' State of Ohio ex rel. Popovici v. Agler, 280 U.S. 379, 384, 50 S.Ct. 154, 155, 74 L.Ed. 489; In re Burrus, 136 U.S. 586, 593, 594, 10 S.Ct. 850, 852, 853, 34 L.Ed. 500.12 And so long as the Congress has not exercised its powers under the Full Faith and Credit Clause to meet the special problems raised by divorce decrees, this Court cannot through its adjudications achieve the result sought to be accomplished by a long train of abortive efforts at legislative and constitutional reform.13 To attempt to shape policy so as to avoid disharmonies in our divorce laws was not a power entrusted to us, nor is the judiciary competent to x ercise it. Courts are not equipped to pursue the paths for discovering wise policy. A court is confined within the bounds of a particular record, and it cannot even shape the record. Only fragments of a social problem are seen through the narrow windows of a litigation. Had we innate or acquired understanding of a social problem in its entirety, we would not have at our disposal adequate means for constructive solution. The answer to so tangled a problem as that of our conflicting divorce laws is not to be achieved by the simple judicial resources of either/or—this decree is good and must be respected, that one is bad and may be disregarded. We cannot draw on the available power for social invention afforded by the Constitution for dealing adequately with the problem, because the power belongs to the Congress and not to the Court. The only way in which this Court can achieve uniformity, in the absence of Congressional action or constitutional amendment, is by permitting the States with the laxest divorce laws to impose their policies upon all other States. We cannot as judges be ignorant of that which is common knowledge to all men. We cannot close our eyes to the fact that certain States make an industry of their easy divorce laws, and encourage inhabitants of other States to obtain 'quickie' divorces which their home States deny them.14 To permit such States to bind all others to their decrees would endow with constitutional sanctity a Gresham's Law of domestic relations.

Fortunately, today's decision does not go that far. But its practical result will be to offer new inducements for conduct by parties and counsel, which, in any other type of litigation, would be regarded as perjury, but which is not so regarded where divorce is involved because ladies and gentlemen indulge in it. But if the doctrine of res judicata as to jurisdictional facts in controversies involving exclusively private interests as infused into the Full Faith and Credit Clause is applied to divorce decrees so as to foreclose subsequent inquiry into jurisdiction, there is neither logic nor reason nor practical desirability in not taking the entire doctrine over. Res judicata forecloses relitigation if there has been an o