If a husband proposes to leave the Republic to live in a foreign land the wife may apply to the courts to be relieved from the usual duty of adopting her husband’s residence.
The husband is the legitimate representative and manager of all of the property of the marriage. He is ordinarily his wife’s representative in legal proceedings. A wife generally cannot appear either personally or by attorney in a suit at law without her husband’s authorization in writing.
If she is of full age a wife does not require her husband’s authorization in the following instances:
A. To defend herself in a criminal action.
B. To bring a suit against her husband.
C. To devise or bequeath her own separate property by a will.
D. When her husband is in what the Mexican lawyers call a state of interdiction, as, for example, when he is under guardianship or insane.
E. When she is in business on her separate account and the suit or proceeding relates to such business.
Divorce.—It is in the chapter of the Civil Code entitled “Del divorcio” that we find the statutory provisions concerning divorce. The chapter begins by stating positively that divorce (divorcio) does not dissolve the bonds of matrimony. We must remember that the Federal Code is founded upon the Spanish Code, and that both Mexico and Spain, being historically Roman Catholic countries, reflect the leading dogmas of the Catholic Church in their civil jurisprudence. What is called a divorce in Mexican law is at the most a separation from bed and board. It simply suspends certain of the civil obligations and effects of marriage.
Causes for Divorce: