The judge, upon seeing and hearing the petitioner and after having made such comment as he may deem proper, will affix his order to the end of the petition, directing the parties to appear before him on a day and at the hour then fixed, and will direct an officer to serve the citation upon the defendant.
It is within the judge’s discretion to grant leave in the same order to the petitioner to reside separate during the pendency of the action from the defendant. If the petitioner be a wife, the judge may fix the place of her temporary residence.
The next step is that upon the day appointed in the citation the judge hears the parties in person. Upon such hearing it is the duty of the judge to do his best to conciliate the parties. In case the parties refuse to be conciliated, or the defendant defaults in appearance, the judge then grants an order certifying to the fact and giving the petitioner leave to issue a citation requiring the defendant to appear in court.
The judge has authority under the code to make such a provisional order respecting the payment to a wife of alimony during the action or concerning the temporary custody of the children as may be necessary and proper.
The case is prepared, investigated and judged in the ordinary form, the Ministère Public being heard. The Ministère Public is an official who performs similar duties to those of a King’s Proctor in England.
The petitioner can at any stage of the case change the petition for a divorce into a petition for a judicial separation.
Newspaper Reports.—The public press is forbidden under penalty of a fine of from 100 to 2,000 francs to publish the evidence in divorce trials.
Effects of Divorce.—Parties who have been divorced cannot become husband and wife again if either of them, after the divorce, have contracted a new marriage since the divorce and been divorced a second time.
If parties who have been divorced wish to become husband and wife again a new marriage is necessary. After such a remarriage no new petition for divorce can be entertained for any cause, except that one of the parties since the remarriage has been sentenced to a punishment which involves corporal detention and is branded with infamy.
A divorced woman cannot remarry until ten months after the divorce has become absolute.