Also known as: change in circumstances · change of circumstances · changed circumstance · material change in circumstances
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A material alteration in facts or conditions arising after execution of an agreement or entry of a decree. The change may render a term unconscionable to enforce or may justify modification of maintenance, support, or trustee removal when the alteration is substantial and continuing.
Cassandra Cooper signed a premarital agreement waiving spousal support. After the wedding she developed a disabling illness that prevented employment while her husband's income grew substantially. At divorce she sought to avoid enforcement of the waiver. The court refused to enforce the term because the post-signing illness created substantial hardship.
Clifford Cox obtained a support order based on his farm income. After a drought he sold the farm and inherited new acreage that produced federal subsidies. He petitioned for downward modification claiming the income shift made the original terms unconscionable. The court examined whether the post-decree changes were substantial and continuing.
Connor Clark executed a will leaving his estate to his spouse. After execution his spouse died and he remarried. He argued the changed family circumstances revoked the will. The court held that a change of circumstances alone does not revoke the will or any part of it.
Curtis Cannon served as trustee of a family trust. After his appointment the trust assets declined sharply in value and the beneficiaries lost confidence. All qualified beneficiaries petitioned for removal. The court considered whether the substantial change of circumstances justified removal when a suitable successor was available.
Carmen Choi challenged a state abortion restriction under an earlier Supreme Court decision. The state argued that intervening medical and social developments constituted changed circumstances requiring reconsideration of the precedent. The Court examined whether the factual underpinnings of the prior holding had been altered enough to warrant overruling.
The Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act of 1982, as amended in 1988 and 1989, established several requirements governing the performance of abortions within the Commonwealth. The Act required a woman seeking an abortion to provide informed consent after receiving specific information from a physician or counselor at least twenty-four hours before the procedure. It mandated that a minor obtain the informed consent of one parent, subject to a judicial bypass option. It further required a married woman to sign a statement confirming that she had notified her husband of her planned abortion, unless certain exceptions applied. The Act also imposed reporting obligations on facilities providing abortion services and defined a medical emergency exception to the various requirements. Before any of these provisions took effect, the petitioners brought suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The petitioners were five abortion clinics and one physician representing himself as well as a class of physicians who provide abortion services. They sought declaratory and injunctive relief and challenged each provision as unconstitutional on its face. The District Court entered a preliminary injunction. After conducting a three-day bench trial, the District Court held all the provisions unconstitutional and entered a permanent injunction against their enforcement by Pennsylvania. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part. It adopted the District Court's factual findings and legal analysis except with respect to the spousal notification requirement. The Court of Appeals upheld the spousal notification requirement as constitutional and applied the undue burden standard in evaluating the provisions. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the constitutionality of the challenged provisions of the Pennsylvania statute.
View caseChristian Coleman preserved gametes before his death. After his passing his spouse sought to use them to conceive a child. The estate argued that intervening events such as remarriage constituted changed circumstances showing lack of consent. The court required affirmative evidence of consent to the new circumstances rather than inferring it from the original preservation.
In January 1993, Lauren Woodward and her husband Warren Woodward, who had been married for approximately three and one-half years and remained childless, learned that Warren had leukemia. The couple arranged for a quantity of Warren's semen to be medically withdrawn and preserved through a process known as sperm banking before he began treatment. Warren underwent an unsuccessful bone marrow transplant and died in October 1993, after which Lauren was appointed administratrix of his estate. In October 1995, Lauren gave birth to twin girls who had been conceived through artificial insemination using Warren's preserved semen. In January 1996, she applied to the Social Security Administration for child's insurance benefits under 42 U.S.C. § 402(d)(1) and mother's benefits under 42 U.S.C. § 402(g)(1). The SSA denied the claims on the ground that the twins were not the husband's children within the meaning of the Act. In February 1996, while pursuing appeals from the SSA denial, Lauren filed a complaint for correction of birth record in the Probate and Family Court against the clerk of the city of Beverly, seeking to add Warren as the father on the twins' birth certificates. In October 1996, a Probate Court judge entered a judgment of paternity based on stipulations of voluntary acknowledgment of parentage and ordered the birth certificates amended to declare Warren the children's father. An administrative law judge conducted a de novo hearing. The judge concluded that the children did not qualify for benefits because they were not entitled to inherit from Warren under Massachusetts intestacy and paternity laws. The SSA appeals council affirmed that decision. Lauren appealed to the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. The court certified the question regarding the inheritance rights of posthumously conceived children under Massachusetts intestacy law to the Supreme Judicial Court because the parties agreed that a determination under state law was dispositive and no directly applicable precedent existed.
View caseA court may refuse enforcement if the term was unconscionable when signed or if enforcement would cause substantial hardship because of a material change arising after signing. The inquiry examines the agreement as a whole and focuses on whether the later facts render enforcement oppressive.
Supporting sources
Modification is permitted only as to future installments and only upon proof of changed circumstances so substantial and continuing that the original terms have become unconscionable. Property divisions are generally not modifiable absent grounds to reopen the judgment.
Supporting sources
No. Under the Uniform Probate Code a change of circumstances does not revoke a will or any part of it except in the narrow situations covered by the slayer and divorce revocation statutes.
Supporting sources
Removal is proper when a substantial change of circumstances has occurred, all qualified beneficiaries request removal, removal best serves the beneficiaries' interests and does not contradict a material purpose of the trust, and a suitable successor is available.
Supporting sources
…use has long been engaged in by similarly situated owners ordinarily imports a lack of any common-law prohibition (though changed circumstances or new knowledge may make what was previously permissible no longer so, see id. , § 827, Comment g. So also does the fact that other landowners, similarly situated, are permitted to…