NPO: State Supreme Judicial Court Backtracks on Alimony Reform Act

Article here. Excerpt:

'The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts has issued three decisions in alimony cases that substantially alter the apparent intention of the Alimony Reform Act.  Steve Hitner, now of the National Parents Organization, was a prime mover behind passage of the Act.  The Alimony Reform Act passed the state legislature unanimously.

Prior to the ARA’s passage, Bay State courts routinely ordered permanent alimony that was difficult to modify even if the payer retired or underwent some other change in circumstances.  Additional problems arose when the payee’s financial circumstances improved as when she began cohabitating with another partner.  That system was an artifact of a time in which fewer women worked for a living, so the law protected their well-being post-divorce.  By passing the ARA, the legislature recognized that the circumstances that gave rise to the previous law mostly no longer obtain.

The plain intention of the legislature was to limit alimony payments in duration and to make downward modifications easier and in some cases, mandatory.  Despite that plain intent, courts in the state have struggled to apply the new law.'