SELFISH INTENTIONS - K-REx - Kansas State University

divorce. They had to have been abandoned or emotionally terrorized in order to have grounds to
file for divorce.
These conservative alterations in divorce law made the relative liberality of western legal
codes regarding divorce even more dramatic. First, the divorce laws of the West provided for a
greater number of grounds for divorce, and hence, provided women (and men) with more options
and a greater ability to use the law. Also, western divorce laws had shorter waiting periods for
establishing residency and for finalizing divorces. The reasons for this openness are not entirely
clear, but most historians believed that it stemmed from the uncertainties of western life. Men
and women faced difficulties unknown to the settled life in the East. Divorce became a remedy
for women especially when their husbands abused them or abandoned them. Abandonment and
extreme cruelty were the top two reasons listed on divorce petitions in the west. As one of the
earliest examples, the state of Illinois provided both men and women with liberal access to
divorce. In that state the circuit courts had held jurisdiction over divorce since 1819 and the state
legislature banned legislative divorces in any capacity in 1839. In particular, Illinois followed,
Indiana as the first states to pass an omnibus, or incompatibility, clause. After the passage of the
omnibus clause, the courts “allowed petitioners to obtain divorces for any misconduct that
resulted in unhappiness and destroyed the marriage relationship.” 51 Historian Stacy Pratt
McDermott argues that many Illinois women used divorce when in a situation of marital
difficulty. 52 She also believes that such “situations” were actually encouraged by the legislature.
She contends that the system of patriarchy had shifted to a system of paternalism in Illinois: “A
paternalistic interpretation suggests that Illinois legislators carefully crafted divorce law in order
51 Stacey Pratt McDermott, “Dissolving the Bonds of Matrimony: Women and Divorce in Sangamon County,
Illinois, 1837-60,” in Daniel W. Stowell, ed., In Tender Consideration: Women, Families, and the Law in Abraham
Lincoln’s Illinois, (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2002), 74.
52 Ibid., 71.
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