Právněhistorické studie / Legal History Studies (Charles University journal; below referred to as PHS or Journal) is a scientific journal listed in the international prestigious database SCOPUS. The journal is published by Charles University in Prague under the guarantee of the Department of Legal History of the Faculty of Law of Charles University. It is published by the Karolinum Press. The journal focuses on the field of legal history and related topics.
Issue 1 of the Journal was published by the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences Publishing in June 1955. The Journal was initially published by the Cabinet of Legal History of the Czechoslovak Academy of Science (CSAV), later by the Institute of State and Law (CSAV) and then by the Institute of Legal History of the Faculty of Law of Charles University.
PHS is issued three times a year in April, August, and December and it presents original scientific works/papers as well as reviews, annotations and news from the scientific field of legal history. It also introduces annotated texts of a legal history nature. PHS accepts manuscripts from domestic as well as foreign authors. Manuscripts submitted by foreign authors are published in original language, namely in English, Slovak, German, French, Italian or Polish.
PHS (ISSN 0079-4929) is registered in the Czech national ISSN centre (supervised by the State Technical Library). The Journal is registered by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic according to Act No. 46/2000 Sb., on Rights and Liabilities for the Publishing of Periodicals and Change of Some Acts (Press Act), and it is allocated with registration number of periodical press MK E 18813.
PHS is an open journal and ensures open access to scientific data (Open Access). The entire content is released as open to the public on the web pages of the journal.
The journal is archived in Portico.
PRÁVNĚHISTORICKÉ STUDIE, Vol 52 No 2 (2022), 81–93
Women and Parliamentary Divorce in England. From Wife-Sale to the Divorce Act of 1857
Dolores Freda
DOI: https://doi.org/10.14712/2464689X.2022.20
published online: 15. 09. 2022
abstract
The essay is a study of divorce in England in the Modern Period, with particular reference to parliamentary divorce, established since the end of the 17th century. If husbands could get rid of undesired wives through wife-selling, private separation deeds, or separation a mensa et thoro awarded by the ecclesiastical courts, they were not permitted to remarry unless they got a private bill from Parliament. Parliament acted as a real court of justice and, being the procedure extremely long and expensive, parliamentary divorce was in fact a privilege reserved to members of the aristocracy in search of a heir. Only in 1857 the Divorce Act legalized divorce in the country through the establishment of the Court for Divorce and Matrimonial Causes.
keywords: divorce; marriage; parliament; England
references (51)
1. A Brief Summary, in Plain Language, of the Most Important Laws Concerning Women, together with a Few Observations Thereon. London: Chapman, 1854.
2. ANDERSON, S. Legislative Divorce. Law for the Aristocracy? In: RUBIN, G. R. - SUGARMAN, D. (eds.). Law, Economy and Society, 1750-1914: Essays in the History of English Law. Worcester: Abingdon, 1984.
3. ANDERSON, O. The Incidence of Civil Marriage in Victorian England and Wales. Past & Present, 1975, LXIX. CrossRef
4. BENTHAM, J. A Comment on the Commentaries and A Fragment on Government. In: BURNS, J. H. - HART, H. L. A. (eds.). The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham. I. Oxford: University Press, 1977.
5. BONFIELD, L. Marriage, Property and the "Affective Family". Law & History, 1983, I. CrossRef
6. CLIFFORD, F. A History of Private Bill Legislation. I. London: Routledge, 1885.
7. COBBETT, W. Complete Collection of State Trials and Proceedings for High Treason. XIII. London: Bagshaw, 1820.
8. COBBETT, W. The Parliamentary History of England. From the Norman Conquest in 1066, to the Year 1803, XXXV. London: Bagshaw, 1800-1801.
9. COMINOS, P. Late Victorian Sexual Respectability and the Social System. International Review of Social History, 1963, VIII. CrossRef
10. CORNISH, W. R. - CLARK, G. de N. Law and Society in England, 1750-1950. London: Sweet & Maxwell, 1989.
11. CRETNEY, S. Family Law in the Twentieth Century. A History. Oxford: University Press, 2003.
12. CROW, D. The Victorian Woman. London: Allen & Unwin, 1971.
13. DICEY, A. V. Diritto e opinione pubblica nell'Inghilterra dell'Ottocento. Bologna: Il Mulino, 1997.
14. DILLON, J. F. Bentham's Influence in the Reforms of the Nineeteenth Century. In: Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, I. Boston: University Press, 1992.
15. DINWIDDY, J. R. Early-Nineteenth-Century Reactions to Benthamism. Transactions of the Royal Historical Society. 1984, XXXIV. CrossRef
16. FAUVE-CHAMOUX. Matrimonio, vedovanza e divorzio. In: BARBAGLI, M. - KERTZER, D. I. (eds.). Storia della famiglia in Europa. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 2002, s. 307-351.
17. FINER, S. E. The Transmission of Benthamite Ideas, 1820-50. In: SUTHERLAND, G. (ed.). Studies in the Growth of Nieneteenth-Century Government. London: Routledge, 1972.
18. First Report of the Commissioners appointed by her Majesty to enquire into the Law of Divorce and more particularly into the Mode of obtaining Divorces a vinculo. In: British Parliamentary Papers. Shannon: Irish University Press, 1969.
19. FREDA, D. In Parlamento come in tribunale. Il divorzio per via parlamentare nell'Inghilterra del Settecento. Historia et ius, 2016, 10.
20. FROST, G. S. Promises Broken. Courtship, Class and Gender in Victorian England. Charlottesville - London: University Press of Virginia, 1995.
21. HARDY, T. The Mayor of Casterbridge. London: Ware, 1998.
22. HOLDSWORTH, W. S. A History of English Law. I. London: Methuen, 1927.
23. HOLCOMBE, L. Wives and Property. Toronto: University Press, 1983. CrossRef
24. HOPPIT, J. Patterns of Parliamentary Legislation 1660-1800. Historical Journal, 1996, XXXIX/I. CrossRef
25. HOPPIT, J. - INNES, J. - STYLES, J. Towards a History of Parliamentary Legislation, 1660-1800. Parliamentary History, 1994, XX.
26. HORSTMAN, A. Victorian Divorce. New York: University Press, 1985.
27. KAHN-FREUND, O. Matrimonial Property in England. In: FRIEDMANN, W. (ed.). Matrimonial Property Law. London: Stevens, 1955.
28. KELLY, H. A. The Matrimonial Trials of Henry VIII, Stanford: University Press, 1976.
29. KENNY, C. Wife-selling in England. Law Quarterly Review, 1929, XLV.
30. KENNY, C. S. History of the Law of England as to the Effects of Marriage on Property. London: Yorke Prize, 1879.
31. LIEBERMAN, D. Codification, Consolidation, and Parliamentary Statute. In: BREWER, J. - HELLMUTH, E. (eds.). Rethinking Leviathan. The Eighteenth-Century State in Britain and Germany, Oxford: University Press, 1999.
32. LIEBERMAN, D. The Province of Legislation Determined: Legal Theory in Eighteenth Century Britain. Cambridge: University Press, 1989. CrossRef
33. MACFARLANE, A. Marriage and Love in England, 1300-1840. Oxford: University Press, 1986.
34. MACQUEEN, J. F. A Practical Treatise on the Appellate Jurisdiction of the House of Lords and Privy Council, together with the Practice on Parliamentary Divorce. London: Maxwell & Son., 1842.
35. MANCHESTER, A. H. Law Reform in England and Wales 1840-80. Acta Juridica, 1977.
36. MENEFEE, S. P. Wives for Sale. Oxford: University Press, 1981.
37. POLDEN, P. Mingling the Waters: Personalities, Politics and the Making of the Supreme Court of Judicature. Cambridge Law Journal, 2002, LI. CrossRef
38. PROBERT, R. The Double Standard of Morality in the Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Act 1857. Anglo-American Law Review, 1999, XXVIII.
39. RHEINSTEIN, M. Marriage Stability, Divorce and the Law. Chicago - London: Methuen, 1972.
40. ROBERTS, D. The Pater Familias of the Victorian Governing Classes. In: WOHL, A. (ed.). The Victorian Family. London: Routledge, 1978.
41. ROWNTREE, G. - CARRIER, N. H. The Resort to Divorce in England and Wales, 1858-1957. Popular Studies, 1958, XI. CrossRef
42. SHANLEY, M. L. "One Must Ride Behind": Married Women's Rights and the Divorce Act of 1857. Victorian Studies, 1982, XXV.
43. SHARPE, P. Marital Separation in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries. Local Population Studies, 1990, XLV.
44. STONE, L. Broken Lives. Separation and Divorce in England 1660-1857. Oxford: University Press, 1993. CrossRef
45. STONE, L. Road to Divorce. England 1530-1987. Oxford: University Press, 1990. CrossRef
46. STONE, L. The Family, Sex and Marriage in England, 1500-1800. New York: University Press, 1979.
47. STONE, L. Uncertain Unions, Marriage in England, 1660-1753. Oxford: University Press, 1992. CrossRef
48. The Annual Register, or a View of the History and Politics of the Year 1857. London: J. G. & F. Rivington, 1858.
49. The Judicature Acts. In: CORNISH, W. - ANDERSON, J. S. - COCKS, R. - LOBBAN, M. - POLDEN, P. - SMITH, K. (eds.). The Oxford History of the Laws of England. 1820-1914. Oxford: University Press, 2010.
50. WOLFRAM, S. Divorce in England, 1700-1857. Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 1985, V/II . CrossRef
51. WOODHOUSE, M. K. The Marriage and Divorce Bill of 1857. The American Journal of Legal History, 1959, III. CrossRef
Women and Parliamentary Divorce in England. From Wife-Sale to the Divorce Act of 1857 is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
240 x 170 mm
periodicity: 3 x per year
print price: 250 czk
ISSN: 0079-4929
E-ISSN: 2464-689X
