回複：緊急求教懂法的朋友。

That sounds really childish.

Perrsonal service is only required at common law to furnish the trial court with personal jurisdiction over the defendant. Modern statutes do not require personal service. In Mullane, the Supreme Court said service must be reasonably calculated, under the circumstances, to give notice to the defendant. Typically you need not even prove that you used reasonable effort to serve. Sometimes police can even use trickey, so long as it is not fraud, to flush him out if he actively conceals himself.

If your hu*****and is a non-resident, which means you two are living in different states, then serivce is a little tougher because he is out of the subpoena power of the court. What you can do is to ask the court to attach his property within the state in which you filed divorce, to force him to show up to defend the property or lose it. That attachment will serve as a notice.

Every jurisdiction has different requirements for service. If yours follows the majority rule, also FRCP 4(e), a certified mail will be sufficient. Another substaituted method is to leave the notice in his normal place of abode, to someone closed related, over majority. Which means, if you have a child living with him, and about majority age, typically 18 in most states, you can leave the notice to the child. But this may apply only to child or spouse. The last resort, you can publish the notice in a local newspaper and a court will allow it.

Many people thought that they are protected by Constitutional guarantee of the Fourteenth Amendment, Due Process of Law (notice and opportunity to be heard), so that if he did not personally receive the notice the court does not have jurisdiction over him. This is wrong. Supreme Court in Mullane made it clear that personal service is not required by Due Process.

Whatever he wants to do, concealing himself in order not to receive notice sounds very childish.