## Facts

- Jack M. Kilgrow (father) and Christine B. Kilgrow (mother) were married, living together in Montgomery, Alabama, and had a seven-year-old daughter, Margaret.
- Margaret attended Loretta School (a parochial school) during the 1956–57 school year, performed well, and was enrolled to return in fall 1957.
- The father alleged the child’s welfare favored returning to Loretta and that the mother threatened to prevent him from taking Margaret to the school.
- The father filed an equity petition seeking temporary and permanent injunctive relief restraining the mother from interfering with Margaret’s attendance at Loretta.
- No divorce, separation, custody contest, or allegation of parental unfitness was pending or asserted.

## Issues

1. Whether a court of equity has jurisdiction to decide, between parents living together with no custody dispute and no claim of unfitness, which school their minor child should attend.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Alabama reversed the injunction and rendered judgment dismissing the father’s petition.
- The Court held equity jurisdiction was not invoked by a disagreement between cohabiting parents over the child’s school when custody was not at issue and neither parent was alleged unfit.
- Because jurisdiction was lacking, the Court did not decide whether Loretta School was in the child’s best interests.

## Legal Principles

- Equity’s authority over minor children generally arises when there is a legally cognizable domestic disruption or risk requiring judicial protection (commonly separation/divorce, a custody contest, or alleged unfitness).
- Courts of equity do not act as referees for ordinary child-rearing disagreements within an intact family where both parents retain custody and fitness is not questioned.
- A generalized claim that a requested order serves a child’s welfare does not, standing alone, create equity jurisdiction absent an established jurisdictional basis.

## Conclusion

The court held that an equity court may not intervene to resolve an educational dispute between parents who are living together and otherwise maintain an intact custodial arrangement; without a custody controversy or allegations of unfitness, the petition for injunctive control over the child’s schooling must be dismissed.


Kilgrow v. Kilgrow, 268 Ala. 475, 107 So. 2d 885 (Ala. 1959)