BODDIE V. CONNECTICUT
401 U.S. 371 (1971)


PROCEDURAL POSTURE:Appellants sought review of a judgment from the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut, which held that a State could limit access to its divorce courts by the requirement of a filing fee or other fees, which effectively barred appellants from commencing actions therein.

FACTS: The State of Connecticut required an average cost of $60 in court fees to bring a divorce in their courts. Boddie was unable to pay either the court fees required by statute or the costs incurred for the service of process. The state did not grant the divorce simply because of their indigency as the clerk of the Superior Court returned the papers on the ground that he could not accept them until the proper fees had been paid. Subsequent efforts to obtain a fee waiver were of no avail. Boddie (P) filed this action in Federal District Court for relief by declaring the statute that required such fees for divorce unconstitutional.

ISSUE: Does due process require that indigent married persons be able to divorce without paying fees due the state according to statutory authority? Can a valid statute become unconstitutional in particular circumstances because it interferes with an individual's exercise of fundamental rights? Does due process require, at a minimum, that, absent a countervailing state interest of overriding significance, persons forced to settle their claims of right and duty through the judicial process must be given a meaningful opportunity to be
heard?

RULE: Due process requires that indigent married persons be able to divorce without paying fees due the state according to statutory authority. A valid statute can become unconstitutional in particular circumstances because it interferes with an individual's exercise of fundamental rights. Due process requires, at a minimum, that, absent a countervailing state interest of overriding significance, persons forced to settle their claims of right and duty through the judicial process must be given a meaningful opportunity to be heard.

ANALYSIS: Appellants, welfare recipients residing in Connecticut, brought an action challenging requirements for payment of court fees and costs for service of process that restricted their access to the courts in an effort to bring an action for divorce. There was no dispute as to the inability of appellants to pay the court fees or costs. The district court found that a state could limit access by the requirement of fees, even when they effectively barred appellants from commencing actions therein. Appellants sought review. The Supreme Court concluded that, given the basic position of the marriage relationship in this society's hierarchy of values and the concomitant state monopolization of the means for legally dissolving this relationship, due process did prohibit a state from denying, solely because of inability to pay, access to its courts to individuals who sought judicial dissolution of their marriages. Thus, the Court held that a state could not, consistent with the obligations imposed on it by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, preempt the right to dissolve this legal relationship without affording all citizens access to the means it had prescribed for doing so.