Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/858

822 HARVARD LAW REVIEW avoided. In a suit for declaration of the validity of the marriage in Wisconsin a decree of nullity was pronounced.^^ It would seem that if this marriage was not contrary to Wisconsin law, the parties would be man and wife until Minnesota, the only state whose law was transgressed, set it aside. The Wisconsin court should have insisted, as did that of Massachusetts, that the parties go back to the state of the marriage if it was to be declared a nullity. Statutory provisions regarding annulment and their interpreta- tion by courts do not furnish much Hght as to the principle behind them. Early American statutes often used the term "divorce" as including both divorce and annulment, though the dissolution from legally existing bonds of matrimony was provided for at an early date.^^ Some of our states have no statutory provisions for annul- ment at all. Colorado makes a cause for divorce what would generally be treated as a basis for a nulUty decree, but does not provide for annulment as such.^^ Without statute it has been recognized that there is general jurisdiction in a court of equity to decree null and void a marriage where the cause alleged is one of the well-known groimds on which equity gives relief in cases of contract. ^^ The frequent situation is that certain causes for annulment are specified in a general chapter on " Divorce " or "Mar- riage and Divorce." ^^ Whether or not a one-year residence require- ment laid down for divorce suits is appHcable to a nullity suit is the subject of a diBference of judicial opinion.'^^ Answering the question may be, as it was in the Minnesota case, a matter of statutory construction, rather than one concerning the nature of annulment. While domicile is enough to found jurisdiction for divorce, statutes generally require a person to be domiciled for a definite period before he can sue for a divorce. And when annul- ment is treated in the same connection, it may well be that such residence is required for this action too. On the ground that the * Kitzman v. Kitzman, i66 N. W. 789 (Wis. 1918.) ^^ See 3 Howard, History of Matrimonial Institutions, 5 et seq. '• See Mills, Annotated Stat. 191 2, c. 46, 977. " 26 Cyc. 908, and caseils cited. '* CoMp. L. of Oklahoma, 1909, c. 87; i Birdseye, Comp. L. of N. Y., 1016; Ken- tucky Stats. 1915, § 260 et seq.; Ka;nsas Gen. Stat. 1915, § 7585. ^' That the statute does apply: Eliot v. Eliot, 77 Wis. 634, 46 N. W. 806 (1890); Wilson V. WUson, 95 Minn. 464, 104 N. W. 300 (1905). Contra, Mctatague v. Montague, 25 S. D. 471, 127 N. W. 639 (1910), Ann. Cab. 1912 C. 591, and note collecting authorities.