Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
A Brief Summary in Plain Language of the Most Important Laws Concerning Women (1854)
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About the print version:
A BRIEF SUMMARY, IN PLAIN LANGUAGE, OF THE MOST IMPORTANT LAWS CONCERNING WOMEN;
TOGETHER WITH A FEW OBSERVATIONS THEREON.
LONDON:
JOHN CHAPMAN,
8, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND.
1854.
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LAWS CONCERNING WOMEN.
LEGAL CONDITION OF UNMARRIED WOMEN OR SPINSTERS.
_________________A single woman.
A SINGLE woman has the same rights to property, to protection from the
law, and has to pay the same taxes to the State, as a man.
_________________No political franchise.
Yet a woman of the age of twenty-one, having the requisite property
qualifications, cannot vote in elections for members of Parliament.
_________________Has a parochial vote.
A woman duly qualified can vote upon parish questions, and for parish
officers, overseers, surveyors, vestry clerks, &c.
_________________Heiress.
If her father or mother die intestate (i.e., without a will) she takes
an equal share with her brothers and sisters of the personal property i.e.,
goods, chattels, moveables), but her eldest brother, if she have one, and his
children, even daughters, will take the real property, (i.e., not personal
property, but all other, as land, &c.), as the heir-at-law; males and their
issue being preferred to females; if, however, she have sisters only, then all
the sisters take the real property equally. If she be an only child, she is
entitled to all the intestate real and personal property.
_________________No public employments.
The church and nearly all offices under government are closed to women.
The Post-office affords some little employment to them; but there is no
important office which they can hold, with the single exception of that of
Sovereign.
The professions of law and medicine,* whether or not closed by law, are
closed in fact. They may engage in trade, and may occupy inferior situations,
such as matron of a charity, sextoness of a church, and a few parochial offices
are open to them. Women are occasionally governors
_________________Elizabeth Blackwell, M.D., received her diploma in America before she walked St.
Bartholomew's Hospital in London.
of prisons for women, overseers of the poor, and parish clerks. A woman may be
ranger of a park; a woman can take part in the government of a great empire by
buying East India Stock.
_________________Domestic servant.
A servant and a master or mistress are bound by a verbal or written
agreement. If no special agreement is made, a servant is held by the common
custom of the realm to be hired from year to year, and the engagement cannot be
put an end to without a month's notice on either side.
_________________Seduction.
If a woman is seduced, she has no remedy against the seducer; nor has
her father, excepting as he is considered in law as being her master and she his
servant, and the seducer as having deprived him of her services. Very slight
service is deemed sufficient in law, but evidence of some service is absolutely
necessary, whether the daughter be of full age or under age.
These are the only special laws concerning single women: the law speaks
of men only, but women are affected by all the laws and incur the same
responsibilities in all their contracts and doings as men.
LAWS CONCERNING MARRIED WOMEN.
_________________Marriage.
Matrimony is a civil and indissoluble contract between a consenting man
and woman of competent capacity.
_________________Prohibitions.
These marriages are prohibited:--A widower with his deceased wife's
sister; a widow with the brother of her deceased husband; a widower with his
deceased wife's sister's daughter, for she is by affinity in the same degree as
a niece to her uncle by consanguinity; a widower with a daughter of his deceased
wife by a former husband; and a widower with his deceased wife's mother's
sister. Consanguinity or affinity, where the children are illegitimate, is
equally an impediment.
A lunatic or idiot cannot lawfully contract a marriage, but insanity
after marriage does not make the marriage null and void.
A lunatic may contract a marriage during a lucid interval. Deaf and dumb
people may marry by signs.
The consent of the father or guardians is necessary to the marriage of
an infant (i.e., a person under twenty-one), unless the marriage takes place by
banns. The consent of the mother is not necessary if there be a father or a
guardian appointed by him.
_________________Bigamy.
A second marriage while a husband or wife is living is felony, and
punishable by transportation.
_________________Breach of promise.
An agreement to marry made by a man and woman who do not come under any
of these disabilities is a contract of betrothment, and either party can bring
an action upon a refusal to complete the contract in a superior court of Common
Law.
_________________Celebration, Banns.
Marriages may be celebrated as a religious ceremony after the requisite
public proclamations or banns, or as a secular form.
_________________Civil marriage.
The object of the Act* for authorizing civil marriages was to relieve
Dissenters and those who could not conscientiously join in the formulary of the
Church. Due provision is made for necessary publicity, and the marriage can be
legally contracted in a Register Office.
_________________Superintendent Registrar.
Marriages in the Church of England (without banns or licence), marriages of
Quakers, Jews, Dissenters, and Roman Catholics, and marriages according to the
civil or secular form, must be preceded by a given notice from of the parties to
the Superintendent-Registrar of the district.
_________________Scotch marriages.
The marriage law of Scotland is founded upon the Canon Law (i.e., rules
drawn from Scriptures and the writings of the Church). In Scotland there are
regular and irregular marriages. Irregular marriages are legal without any
ceremony, and are of three sorts.
1. By a promise of marriage given in writing or proved by a reference to
the oath of the party, followed by consummation.
2. By the solemn mutual declaration of a man and woman, either verbally
or in writing, expressing that the parties consent to take each other for
husband and wife.
3. By notorious cohabitation as man and wife.
Persons living in England and having illegitimate children, cannot by going to Scotland, there marrying, and then returning, legitimatize their children in England. A domicile (or abiding home) in Scotland, and a marriage of the father and mother, legitimatizes the children in Scotland whenever born.
_________________Foreign marriages valid.
Lawful marriages in foreign countries are valid in England unless they
are directly contrary to our laws.
Marriage with a deceased wife's sister is valid in England, if it has
been celebrated in a country where such marriage is legal, provided the parties
were at the time of the marriage domiciled in such country.
_________________Married women no legal existence.
A man and wife are one person in law; the wife loses all her rights as a
single woman, and her existence is entirely absorbed in that of her husband. He
is civilly responsible for her acts; she lives under his protection or cover,
and her condition is called coverture.
_________________A husband has a right to the person of his wife.
A woman's body belongs to her husband; she is in his custody, and he can
enforce his right by a writ of habeas corpus.
_________________Her personal property becomes his.
What was her personal property before marriage, such as money in hand,
money at the bank, jewels, household goods, clothes, &c., becomes absolutely her
husband's, and he may assign or dispose of them at his pleasure whether he and
his wife live together or not.
_________________He takes her chattels real.
A wife's chattels real (i.e., estates held during a term of years, or
the next presentation to a church living, &c.) become her husband's by his doing
some act to appropriate them; but, if the wife survives, she resumes her
property.
_________________Equity.
Equity is defined to be a correction or qualification of the law,
generally made in the part wherein it faileth, or is too severe. In other words,
the correction of that wherein the law, by reason of its universality, is
deficient. While the Common Law gives the whole of a wife's personal property to
her husband, the Courts of Equity, when he proceeds therein to recover property
in right of his wife, oblige him to make a settlement of some portion of it upon
her, if she be unprovided for and virtuous.
If her property be under 200l., or 10l. a-year, a Court of Equity will
not interpose.
_________________Her right to support.
Neither the Courts of Common Law nor Equity have any
direct power to oblige a man to support his wife,--the Ecclesiastical Courts
(i.e. Courts held by the Queen's authority as governor of the Church, for
matters which chiefly concern religion) and a Magistrate's court at the instance
of her parish alone can do this.
_________________His power over her real ...
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