[585] Codes and Gen. Stat. (1892), I, 664 (act of Oct. 11, 1862); Codes and Stat. (1902), I, 456.
[586] Ann. Codes and Stat. (1897), II, 1600.
[587] This is the duty of the district attorney in Idaho, and of the county attorney in Utah, when the ground of the petition is the alleged insanity of the defendant: Gen. Laws of Id. (1895), 12; Laws of Utah (1903), 39, 40; and of the prosecuting attorney in Michigan, when there are children under fourteen years of age whose interests require his intervention: Howell, Gen. Stat., III, 3605; Miller, Comp. Laws (1899), III, 2665.
[588] Cal. Stat. and Amend. to the Codes (1891), 279; ibid. (1893), 48; ibid. (1900-1901), 444; Rev. Stat. of Ill. (1898), 633, 634; Rev. Stat. of Ind. (1896), I, sec. 2129; Bates, Ann. Rev. Stat. of Ohio (1897), II, 3218; Ann. Codes and Stat. of Wash. (1897), II, 1987, 1988; Gen. Laws of Minn. (1901), 286. By Laws of N. Y. (1902), I, 536, this offense is made a misdemeanor. Cf. Laws of Montana (1903), 146.
[589] Rev. Stat. (1896), I, 1049.
[590] Act of Feb. 11, 1897: Pub. Acts of Mich., 12; ibid. (1899), 69.
[591] See chap, viii, sec. i; and consult Glasson, Le mar. civil et le divorce, 210 ff., 232-51.
[592] On the revolutionary legislation regarding marriage and divorce (1792-1816) see Naquet, Le divorce (Paris, 1877), 37-56, 153-353, containing extracts from the debates, text of the laws, reports, and other documents; Archives parlementaires, XXVI, 166-86, giving the report on the proposed civil marriage law; Wright, Report, 1004-6, presenting summaries of the laws; Champion, "La revolution et la réforme de l'état civil," La révolution française, June 14, 1887; Colfavru, "La question du divorce devant les législateurs de la révolution," ibid., March 14, 1884; Koenigswarter, Histoire de l'organisation de la famille en France, 268 ff.; Glasson, Le mar. civil et le divorce, 252-75; Legrand, Le mariage et les mœurs en France, 196-99; Durrieux, Du divorce, 99 ff.; Féval, Pas de divorce, 74 ff.; Fiaux, La femme, le mariage, et le divorce, 25 ff.; Vraye and Gode, Le divorce et la séparation du corps, I, 7-26; Bertillon, Étude démographique du divorce, 89 ff.; and in general Lasaulx, Uebereinstimmung der französischen Ehetrennungsgesetze mit Gotteswort (Koblenz and Hadamar, 1816).
A powerful influence on revolutionary opinion must have been exerted by the remarkable Contrat conjugal, published in 1781, again in 1783, and in German translation in 1784, which advocated civil marriage and free divorce, while attacking the ecclesiastical system of impediments and dispensations. The revolutionary ideas regarding divorce are also vigorously presented by Hennet, Du divorce (3d ed., Paris, 1792); and by Bouchotte, Observations sur le divorce (Paris, 1790). On the other hand, the divorce law of 1792 is criticised and divorce opposed by Madame Necker, Réflexions sur le divorce (Paris, 1792; Lausanne, 1794); as in Du divorce (Paris, 1801), 1 ff., by Bonald, who opposed the law of 1803 and secured its repeal in 1816. See Père Daniel's Le mariage chrétien et le Code Napoléon (Paris, 1870); and for an examination of the literature of the period, Tissot, Le mariage, la séparation, et le divorce, 174 ff., 180 ff., 196 ff., 211 ff., 222 ff.
[593] In Paris alone during the first twenty-seven months after the passage of the act 5,994 divorces were granted; while in 1797 the divorce decrees in that city actually outnumbered the marriages: Glasson, Le mar. civil et le divorce, 261, 262. Accordingly, in 1798, the law was amended so as to make divorce for "incompatibility allowable only six months after final failure of attempts at reconciliation;" and this law also required all municipal authorities to proceed, and all teachers of public and private schools to take their pupils, "to the usual meeting places of the community every ten years in person and in state, there to make stern proclamation of the parties divorced during the previous decade, with the view of thus checking divorces."—Wright, Report, 1005; Naquet, Le divorce, 212-37, giving documents; Brun, "Divorce Made Easy," North Am. Rev., CLVII (July, 1893), 12, 13; citing Duval, Souvenirs thermidoriens, I, 60, 61. See also the Rapport (27 thermidor, an. V) of Portalis, who was the chief advocate of the amendment. In 1800, it is alleged, there were about 4,000 marriages and 700 divorces in Paris. To what extent the relative decrease was due to the change in the law can only be conjectured.