| judgments regarding their potential mates. In addition, it removes others from debilitating situations that develop after marriage; situations that are sometimes difficult to foresee, including spouse abuse or sexual exploitation of children. In yet other cases, husbands and wives discover that they are unable to function in a heterosexual marriage because of their own homosexual orientation. |
| My support of divorce is not meant to suggest that we abandon our ideal of marriage as a lifetime commitment. It simply asks that we recognize that many couples are unable to sustain such a commitment. Divorce allows these couples to dissolve dysfunctional unions. After divorcing, they have the opportunity to reassess themselves and perhaps form functional, satisfying marriages with other mates. |
| Agreed, some people may exploit lenient divorce laws by divorcing their spouses heedlessly and impetuously. But the historical record indicates that people forced to stay in failed marriages against their wills usually sabotage their relationships, either consciously or unconsciously. Adultery, abuse, and desertion are frequent occurrences among such couples. In addition, other distraught spouses find illicit ways around restrictive divorce laws. They falsify grounds for annulments or perhaps leave the United States to obtain a divorce elsewhere. When people remain in difficult marriages or circumvent the law, it often costs them, their spouses, children, relatives, friends, and employers, as well as society, dearly. |
| These ideas, which are not original with me, come up many times throughout the following narrative. I also present other viewpoints concerning divorce fully and, I hope, fairly. I would encourage readers who disagree with my position from the outset to persevere, both to give my view a hearing and for what they might learn about the historical development of divorce in the United States. |
| My major goal, however, is not to argue for the rightness of my view of divorce and the wrongness of others. Rather, my primary concern is to reveal that the historical conflict between anti-divorce and pro-divorce factions has prevented the development of effective, beneficial divorce laws, procedures, and policies. Today we still lack processes that move spouses out of unworkable marriages in a constructive fashion and get them back into the mainstream of life in a stable, productive condition. |
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