Is stopping loving someone a reason to get divorced? – 04/07/2024 – Balance

It is often said that “first comes love, then comes marriage.” But not everyone agrees.

The idea that love is the most important reason to get married—or, at least, to stay married—is increasingly contested.

In the United States, Republican lawmakers and experts have rejected the possibility of unjustified divorce. They question the notion that falling out of love with one’s partner is a valid reason to end a marriage.

As a family law professor, I know these views are not new.

Actress and socialite Zsa Zsa Gabor (1917-2016) once quipped: “Getting a divorce just because you don’t love a man is almost as foolish as marrying one just because you love him.”

Gabor was probably joking, but the Republican attack on divorce is serious.

The History of Divorce in the USA

For most of the history of the United States, it was difficult to get a divorce.

In many states, it was strictly prohibited, while others allowed couples to separate only in very limited circumstances — typically cases of cruelty, desertion, or adultery.

Therefore, unhappy couples who could not prove these reasons did not find a way out.

In 1969, California became the first state to allow no-cause divorce. With this, one of the spouses could obtain a divorce simply by submitting the request, without having to prove that their partner had done anything wrong.

After approval in California, other American states quickly followed.

In 1977, 47 states allowed this type of divorce and, in 1985, all 50 American states allowed some type of unjustified divorce.

But now, almost 50 years later, more and more questions are emerging about this in the United States.

The issue of unprovoked divorce gained national attention again in 2023, when conservative commentator Steven Crowder, who boasts about his “provocative” views, expressed his outrage and disbelief that his wife could divorce him without his consent.

Crowder is not the only one to voice these criticisms. Divorce has become a contentious issue among many legislators in Republican-majority states.

Most recently, in January 2024, Oklahoma Senator Dusty Deevers introduced a bill to eliminate no-cause divorce. He suggested the “public humiliation” of spouses who commit marital failures, followed by divorce.

Restricting no-cause divorce is also part of the Texas and Nebraska Republican Party platforms. It was also recently debated by Louisiana lawmakers.

The possibility of getting a divorce, regardless of what the other party wants, is the essence of an unjustified divorce. I find it alarming that he is being questioned.

But the idea that no longer loving is a valid reason for divorce must be considered. It is based on the notion that love is the purpose of marriage and this idea, in itself, is questionable.

What is marriage for, anyway?

Marriage is a civil status that confers important rights and benefits on spouses. And these rights and benefits have nothing to do with love.

In fact, the purpose of these perks is to give couples reasons other than love to get married. The idea is that the social benefits of marriage are so significant that they justify encouraging marriage, or even simply paying people to get married.

To give an example of this cost-benefit analysis, let’s consider the political debate that examines whether children are better off being raised by two married parents.

In her recent book The Two-Parent Privilege: How Americans Stopped Getting Married and Started Falling Behind, the professor of economics Melissa Kearney argues that this is a comprehensive and significant advantage.

Not surprisingly, Kearney’s work was enthusiastically endorsed by pro-marriage advocates and reinvigorated long-standing discussions about how to encourage people to marry.

If children do better when they are raised by married parents, it is understandable that the government would create laws and policies to promote marriage. This also explains why the government may seek to limit divorces.

This is a purely instrumental view of marriage, which would have seemed very familiar to 18th and 19th century Americans.

For most of American history, marriage was openly a transaction. The laws essentially guaranteed that most men and women would get married and love had nothing to do with it.

‘Marital bargain’

Historians refer to marrying for legal and financial benefits as the “marital bargain.”

But by the end of the 19th century, acceptance of the commercial nature of marital bargaining began to fade. Men and women began to publicly declare that love was the purpose of marriage.

As historian Nancy Cott writes in her book Public Vows, by the turn of the 20th century, American culture had “placed love and money on opposite sides of the street.”

My book, You’ll Do: A History of Marrying for Reasons Other than Love, also examines this story and shows how Americans stopped encouraging marital bargaining and started to consider it harmful, both for couples and for the institution of marriage as a whole.

Despite the public view that love is the only reason to get married, the law takes a more practical approach and recognizes that love alone may not be enough to get couples to the altar.

This is why legislation continues to encourage marriage for instrumental reasons. Their benefits range from tax exemptions and immigration preferences to criminal law defenses.

When marriage was a clear bargain for exchange, the benefits of the union were obvious.

Like the 19th century marital ad, “Man with Farm Seeks Woman with Tractor,” each side knew what they were getting. Now, the purpose of marriage is no longer so clear.

I believe the movement to eliminate no-fault divorce is simply the latest symptom of this confusion about the purposes of marriage.

If marriage is a matter of love, the lack of love should then be the reason for divorce par excellence. But if marriage is a contract with benefits, it is not surprising that Crowder and other critics of no-fault divorce are outraged that marriage can be dissolved unilaterally.

The willingness to eliminate unjustified divorce is presented as a struggle over the purpose of divorce. But really, it’s a struggle over the meaning of marriage.

* Marcia Zug is a professor of Family Law at the University of South Carolina, in the United States.

This article was originally published on the academic news website The Conversation and is republished under a Creative Commons license. Read the original English version here.