of a conviction within one year previously for attempt to murder the petitioner, or of having assaulted him or her with intent to inflict grievous bodily harm, or on the ground that the respondent has repeatedly during that period assaulted and cruelly beaten the petitioner; on the ground that the respondent husband has been, in the preceding five years, frequently convicted of crimes, and has been sentenced in the aggregate to imprisonment for three years, and has habitually left his wife without means of support; on the ground that the respondent husband has been guilty of adultery in the conjugal residence, or coupled with circumstances or conduct of aggravation or of repeated acts of adultery.
Western Australia. Until 1912 the divorce laws of this state, which were regulated by an ordinance (27 Viet. No. 19), were similar in all respects to the laws of England, but Act No. 7 of 1912 contains material alterations in the law.
The causes upon which the divorce may be granted, as enumerated in that Act, are adultery; malicious desertion for five years; on the ground that the respondent (husband) has been a habitual drunkard for four years, and has either habitually left his wife without means of support or has been guilty of cruelty towards her; or, the husband being the petitioner, that his wife for a like period has been a habitual drunkard, and has habitually neglected her domestic duties or rendered herself unfit to discharge them ; on the ground of imprison- ment for three years under commuted sentence for a capital crime or under sentence for seven years or upwards, or, the wife being the petitioner, that the husband has been in the last five years frequently convicted, has had sentences of three years in the aggregate, and has habitually left his wife without means of support ; on the ground of conviction for attempt to murder the petitioner or inflicting grievous bodily harm on him or her; further, on the ground that the respondent is a lunatic or a person of unsound mind, has been confined in an asylum or other institution in accordance with the pro- visions of the Lunacy Act of 1903 for a period or periods not less in the aggregate than five years within six years immediately preceding the suit and is unlikely to recover.
(III.) EUROPEAN COUNTRIES
It should be kept in mind that in all countries the Roman Catholic Church absolutely forbids its adherents to apply to the civil courts for a divorce a vinculo, and in modern European states there is frequently a conflict between the law of the State and the law of the Church on this subject. In certain cases the Church permits the spouses to separate and will sometimes annul a marriage if properly approached.
Austria. In Austria, among Protestants, divorce may be granted on the ground of adultery, namely, the adultery of the wife, con- demnation for crime, immoral habits, infectious diseases, ill-treat- ment, threats or serious vexations, unconquerable aversion; and among the Jews by mutual consent, or on the adultery of the wife.
Belgium. In Belgium, divorce is granted on the following grounds, namely, the adultery of the wife, the adultery of the hus- band if he shall have kept his mistress in the common residence, violence endangering life (exces), cruelty (sevices), grave indignities (injures graves), sentence of one of the parties to an infamous punish- ment involving loss of civil rights, mutual and unwavering consent of the parties expressed in manner prescribed by law.
Bulgaria. By the law of the orthodox Greek Church, and there- fore of Bulgaria, divorce a vinculo only is recognized. It may be granted on the grounds of adultery, cruelty, threat or designs against the life of the other party to the marriage, absence of the husband for four years if his whereabouts are unknown, or, if his whereabouts are known, without sending his wife means of support ; impotence; insanity; epilepsy; idiocy, or syphilis supervening after marriage and incurable; sentence to severe or degrading punish- ment for theft, fraud, embezzlement or homicide; unsubstantiated charge of adultery made by one party to the marriage against the other; unnatural crime of the husband upon his wife; restraint on religious liberty; drunkenness, when accompanied by squandering property or destroying the home, or an otherwise disorderly or dissolute manner of life ; abandonment of the husband by the wife, driving him from his home without sufficient grounds followed by refusal for three years to live with him again.
Denmark. In Denmark judicial divorces are obtainable on ihe grounds of adultery, bigamy, desertion (if malicious, after three years; if simple, i.e. absence without known or apparent cause, after seven years), absence for five years where the presumption is that the absentee is dead, imprisonment for life. Administrative divorces may also be obtained on the grounds of insanity, separa- tion for three years, sentence of three years' penal servitude.
France. In France, divorce, which had been introduced for the first time in 1792, but had been abolished at the Restoration in 1816, resumed its place in the Civil Code in 1884. The grounds upon which it is now permitted are adultery, violence endangering life (exces), cruelty (sevices), grave indignities (injures graves), condem- nation of either spouse to an afflictive punishment.
Germany. By the German Civil Code of 1900 all the previous laws of the federal states have been abolished, and the absolute
grounds upon which decrees for divorce are now granted throughout the German Reich are adultery, bigamy, crime against nature, attempt on the life of the other party to the marriage, malicious desertion for one year, insanity of three years' duration after the marriage, destroying intellectual communion between parties, and holding out no hope of recovery. The Court has a discretion to grant divorce on the ground of serious breach of conjugal duties, and dishonourable or immoral conduct, under which all vices and bad habits may furnish a sufficient ground.
Greece. Divorce in Greece is regulated by the Roman and Byzantine laws, in accordance with the provisions contained in the collection of Harmenopoulos. The grounds for divorce are estab- lished in No. 117 of the Novellae Constitutiones of Justinian (with some important amendments) and are, on the petition of the hus- band, adultery; that the wife attempted the life of her husband, or, being aware of plots against it, has not disclosed them to him; non-disclosure to her husband of knowledge of a conspiracy against the sovereign; without her husband's consent staying the night at another house, except the house of her parents; without her hus- band's consent attending races, theatres or sports; against her husband's wish attending dinners or bathing in the company of men ; procuring abortion. On a wife's petition, the grounds are, that the husband entertained schemes against the sovereign, or, being aware of such, has not denounced them to the authorities; that the husband has attempted the life of his wife, or, being aware of plots against it, has not disclosed them to her, or undertaken to prosecute the authors of them; that he has endeavoured to procure her to commit adultery ; that he has brought a false accusation of adultery against her; adultery in the conjugal home; adultery in the same town, if persisted in; impotence of husband, existing before mar- riage and continuing at least three years after it.
Hungary. Prior to 1894, each religious denomination was gov- erned by separate regulations, but in that year marriage and divorce in Hungary and Transylvania were regulated by the Civil Marriage bill of that year which came into force in 1895; and the absolute grounds upon which divorce is permitted by the State (see note above), without distinction of creeds, are adultery; unnatural crimes; bigamy; desertion; attempt upon life or serious maltreat- ment endangering safety or health ; sentence of death or penal ser- vitude or imprisonment for five years. The discretionary grounds are violation of marital obligations, other than above; inducing or attempting to induce a child of the family to a criminal act or immoral life; the respondent persisting in leading an immoral life.
Italy. No divorce is permitted.
The Netherlands. Adultery and malicious desertion under Roman Dutch law; and, by more recent addition, imprisonment for four years; grave injuries or ill-treatment endangering life; a lapse of five years after a judicial separation (by consent or otherwise) without reconciliation, are now grounds for divorce.
J Norway. The Norwegian Act of Aug. 20 1909 has effected radical changes in the law. Either party to the marriage is now entitled to a divorce, where, at the time of marriage, the other spouse, without the knowledge of the former, has suffered from a physical defect making him or her unsuited for marriage, or from epilepsy, or leprosy, or from venereal disease in an infectious form, or from insanity ; or (the husband being petitioner) where the wife has been made pregnant by someone other than the husband; where either party has been guilty of certain crimes dealt with in the General Criminal Code, such as the contracting and transmitting, or exposing any others to, an infectious sexual disease, which has been contracted in consequence of immoral conduct, a serious offence against de- cency, or against a child under 16 or anyone being a ward of the party, incest, unnatural offences, etc.; adultery, bigamy, or such crimes as are dealt with in the Criminal Code, e.g. abduction of children and minors from the care of their parents and guardians, or a crime involving bodily injury of the other spouse, or of any deliberate crime by which the other spouse suffers injury in body or in health; or cruelty to children; or exposing them to conditions which are clearly dangerous to their morals; sentence of loss of liberty for three years or upwards ; sentence to hard labour or con- finement in an inebriate home for repeated acts of vagrancy or drunkenness; refusal of conjugal rights for two years; insanity for three years with no reasonable prospect of recovery ; where a separa- tion has been in existence for two years after formal decree, or for one year after such decree, if both parties assent to its becoming a decree of divorce ; where there has been a separation for three years without decree, and no conjugal relations during that time (see also Report of Divorce Commission, Appendix V., pp. 43-5).
Portugal. Prior to 1910, there was no law of divorce in Portugal. By Article 4 of a law passed on Nov. 4 of that year (copy set out in Appendix XXII., Report of Divorce Commission, pp. 152-3), the causes for divorce are: (i) adultery; (2) conviction of one of the major crimes specified in Articles 55 and 57 of the Penal Code; (3) ill-treatment ; (4) abandonment of home for not less than three years ; () absence for not less than four years, during which the absentee gives no tidings of himself or herself; (6) incurable lunacy, three years after the date on which insanity has been declared by the com- petent authorities; (7) separation de facto by mutual consent for 10 years; (8) inveterate gambling habits; (9) incurable contagious disease or any disease which induces sexual aberration.
