Sexual Incompatibility in the Divorce Court
| Author | Naomi Michaels |
| Date | 01 March 1966 |
| Published date | 01 March 1966 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1966.tb01118.x |
198
THE
MODERN
LAW
REVIEW
VOL.
29
SEXUAL
INCOMPATIBILITY
IN
TEE
DIVORCE
COURT
THE
experiences of marriage guidance counsellors and many who
work in related fields point to the fact that one
of
the commonest
causes of matrimonial breakdown is sexual incompatibility.
Lawyers who remain unconvinced of this need only reflect upon
the large number of reported divorce cases in which sexual dif€icul-
ties have been the root-cause of the parties’ troubles, ultimately
leading either to adultery
or
to
a
charge of cruelty based upon the
respondent’s attitude towards sexual relations.
Only
a
short while
ago
the cases of
P.
v.
P.’
and
P.
(D.)
v.
P.
(J.)
a
were commented upon in these pages.8 Those cases dealt
with the question
as
to whether persistent refusal of marital inter-
course due to lack of interest or invincible psychological inhibitions
could amount to cruelty now that the House of
Lords
has obliged
us
to revise
our
opinions
as
to the nature of that offence.‘
In
P.
v.
P.,
it
was decided that
a
husband who, due to lack of inclination,
had refused to have sexual relations with his wife during
a
period of
some fifteen years’ cohabitation had not been cruel to her.
On
the
other hand,
in
P.
(D.)
v.
P.
(J.),
the court found cruelty proved in
the case of
a
wife whose invincible psychological fear of conception
and childbirth had resulted
in
eventual cesser of sexual relations
between the
spouse^.^
Since then, however, the Court of Appeal appears to have
endorsed the decision of Judge Harold Brown,
Q.c.,
in the case
of
P.
v.
P.
In
B.
(L.)
v.
B.
(R.),O
the parties were married
in
1960,
the husband being then aged twenty-seven and the wife twenty.
From shortly after the honeymoon the husband showed little
interest in the sexual side of marriage and intercourse took place
very
infrequently. The wife complained to her husband that his
conduct was affecting her health, but he failed to respond to those
complaints.
In
April
1008
the wife left the matrimonial home for
a
short period, but she later returned after the husband had admit-
ted that he had been
at
fault and promised to alter his attitude in
the future.
For
two weeks after the wife’s return sexual relations
were relatively harmonious, but then the husband relapsed into his
former pattern of behaviour. By October of that year the husband’s
conduct had reduced his wife to
a
state of extreme nervous tension,
8
$~e-(i96ti).28M.L.R.’6bo.
a
4
See
Gollins
8.
Gollins
fl964]
A.C.
644
and
Williams
V.
Williams
[1964]
--
A.C.
098.
5
See
aleo
the decieion
of
Cairns
J.
in
Eoans
V.
Eoans
‘[1965]
2
All
E.R.
789,
where
the hueband eucceeded in eetabliehing cruelty against hie wife, hie
principal allegation being that she
had
refused him
eexual
intercourse. There,
however, there wne
.no
evidence that the wife’e rcfueal had proccedcd
from
natural dieinclination, and there wan
aleo
the additional charge that
ehe
had
refueed
to
eharo in entertsinmente which
had
hitherto formed the basis
of
the partied social life
to
ether.
a
[iooa]
1
W.L.B.
1418;
[fgciq
a
AN
E.B.
26s
(c.A.).
To continue reading
Request your trial