Talk:Breach of promise

Breach

Breach of promise was not based on a presumption of lost virginity (at least not in the 18th and 19th centuries) -- it was both cruder than that (based on the denial of the woman's expectation of being supported by the man's £$CASH MONEY$£), and much more subtle than that, since there were a lot of ways in which the reputation of a young never-married woman of the "genteel" classes could be damaged by a broken engagement (or an apparent period of intimacy which did not end in a publicly-announced engagement), even if few people seriously thought that she had lost her physical virginity. Churchh 12:50, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

The recent edits haven't improved the article in this area, because now the article confusingly jumps straight from the middle ages to the 1920s. Churchh (talk) 22:31, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

The early 20th century was strongly diverging from Victorian social norms (slowly before WW1, very rapidly after), and if the two periods are put side by side without any context at all, it could be very misleading to the uninitiated. Churchh (talk) 06:53, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

There was a strong revolution in mores and morals in the generation between about 1895 (when Victorian norms prevailed with very little relaxation of strictness) and about 1925 (when uninhibited "flappers" wore loose-fitting dresses with hemlines rapidly rising towards the knees). WhatamIdoing, your edits tended to obscure such crucial chronology and juxtapose divergent historical periods, which is why I had to add some context. Churchh (talk) 03:42, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I would assume that a breach of promise suit was also about opportunity costs. If a Man ties up a Woman in the expectation of marriage for a long period of time and then dumps her, she loses the opportunity to be courted by others for that period of time. Afterward, she bears the stigma of having been evaluated and dumped (people will wonder why) as well as the stigma of implied intimacy. In a world where a woman was normally unable to earn a living, acquire significant education, or own property, such lost opportunities could have been potentially very significant to her life long welfare and that of any future children. The character of the marriage was everything. Eperotao (talk) 20:02, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

social morals have led to the decline of this sort of action

Well no, and no. Social mores have lead to the return of this sort of action. It was removed from English law: it has returned under a different name.

States like New Zealand now recognise all marriages based on the relationship. Weddings, licensure, and certification are no longer relevant to determinations of financial responsibility in NZ.

States like California have for decades allowed "palimony" (by analogy with alamony) where a partner in an unlicensed, uncertified relationship may sue for financial support based on an implied contract - ie breach of promise. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.214.18.240 (talk) 05:11, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

In past centuries, there was an extremely sharp legal distinction between being married and not being married, and a woman had no claims on a man she was not married to. In that situation, "breach of promise" was kind of a limited safety-valve in response to the fact that in the society of that time women suffered much more severe consequences from a damaged reputation than men did -- it recompensed or deterred (to a very limited degree) some injustices arising from social double standards. In the last thirty or forty years, the existence of a relationship has given some legal rights in some jurisdictions regardless of marriage status, so that there has been a blurring of the sharpness of the distinction between marriage and non-marriage (such as with "palimony"), and this has little to do with double standards on how men vs. women are allowed to behave, or the violation of a promise to marry in future. So I don't think I'd say that breach of contract is returning... Churchh (talk) 16:13, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Well, it depends on what you mean by "past centuries", and what you mean by "people". Wealthy and powerful people had to deal with different rules compared to impoverished people. For centuries, merely claiming to be married constituted a "legal" marriage for a poor, landless, untitled person, but this did not always suffice for a noble. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:55, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

During the period (before the 1920s) when a never-married young woman's reputation could be easily "ruined", with highly-deleterious effects on her chances of ever being respectably married, upper-class and upper middle class families could afford lawyers who would give them a good chance of prevailing in a breach of promise action, but in most cases they were very reluctant to bring such a lawsuit, since win or lose the outcome would be significant damage to their daughter's reputation. As for "common-law marriage", in the days before the establishment of a central registry in the 1830s, marriage records in England were kept in the registers of each local parish, and subject to many vicissitudes. What "common-law marriage" basically meant before that time was that if a couple came into a neighborhood and introduced themselves to all their neighbors as "Mr. and Mrs. Smith", and then after some years Mr. Smith died, if anyone wanted to dispute Mr. Smith's inheritance by claiming that Mr. Smith was not actually legally married, then the burden of proof was on the person disputing the inheritance (not on the person who had lived openly with Mr. Smith as his claimed wife for an extended period). Churchh (talk) 22:25, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Sure, in 1800. In England.

In 800, not so much. In 800 BCE, probably not at all. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:12, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

English common law didn't exist in anything like the form known to Blackstone until long after 800 AD. Churchh (talk) 06:43, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Yup. But is England the only country in your world? Is this article solely about Breach of promise in England? WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:30, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

This article is about the Common Law, and England is the source of the Common Law, and English-speaking countries are those most affected by Common Law. If there's an equivalent to Breach of promise in other legal systems, the details and history will be different, and it should be handled separately. Churchh (talk) 03:31, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

India

This information was added without a source: "In India, breach of promise to marry is considered a serious crime and it tantamount to rape if court feels that the promise was not made with a intent of marriage. The 'intent' is always analyzed by the way the man behaved in a relation. Man might have to introduce his girl friend to parents when they were in a relation. Many a times, the intent is determined as malafide and man can be imprisoned for a minimum term of 7 years." and promptly removed.

I wonder whether it's verifiable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:48, 29 April 2017 (UTC)

Capitalisation

The article contains 'Breach of Promise' written both in capitals and lowercase. Which is correct (the article title indicates lowercase)? Obscurasky (talk) 15:28, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

Non-common-law jurisdictions

While the leading paragraph defines this as a common law tort, there is a section “Non-common-law jurisdictions”. Civil action used to be possible on a statutory basis e.g. in Finland: fi:kihlaero. Kaihsu (talk) 18:48, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

But a statutory action in a civil law system is not the common law tort of breach of promise of marriage, which is what this article is about. I can't add anything about the common law tort of breach of promise of marriage for the Quebec civil law system, or the French civil law system, or the Finnish civil law system, because none of those systems have that common law tort action.

Even the term "tort" is unique to the common law systems. There are no torts in the civil systems; there are délits and quasi-délits (to use the French terminology), but there are no torts. The section referring to civil systems actually makes the point that those systems don't have the tort of breach of promise of marriage.

If you want to turn the article into a general survey of how different legal systems treat the consequences of non-marriage, then you have to change the name of the article, the lead paragraphs, and delete the infobox, since it would no longer be an article about tort law. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 19:02, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

Thanks; that’s clear. For now, I moved the section “Non-common-law jurisdictions” under “Similar actions in law” and removed the “globalize” template. Kaihsu (talk) 20:09, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

Thanks very much! I’m not opposed to comparative law articles; in fact I enjoy them, since I’m trained in both the common law and the civil law. Just the this article is specific to the common law. I appreciated the discussion. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 20:39, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

Excellent; thanks. Wikidata links to the Hebrew and Finnish articles, neither of which discusses the common law tort (okay maybe the Israeli one does), but I will leave them there for now. Kaihsu (talk) 21:22, 9 November 2021 (UTC)