The Evolution of Law and Wife Abuse

Bibliographic Data

ID6090619
AuthorsNan Oppenlander (Rhode Island College, corresponding author)
Year1981
Volume3
Issue4
Pages382-405
Publication date1981-10-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueLaw & Policy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0265-8240 • E-ISSN: 1467-9930
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1467-9930.1981.tb00256.x
OpenAlexW1993064931
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited13

For over 2000 years, laws have allowed husbands to beat their wives. Until the last century, American law conformed to this tradition. This article traces the roots of American law to English and Roman law, the latter giving husbands life‐and‐death authority over wives. In the nineteenth century American state courts permitted husbands to beat their wives for misconduct. Pioneering women in the temperance, abolitionist, and women's rights movements first attacked the common law ofwife‐beating and restrictive divorce policies. By the 1870s, wife‐beating became outlawed. Earlier in the nineteenth century, legislatures had expanded the grounds for divorce, opening an avenue of escape for physically abused wives. But the law still gives limited protection to assaulted spouses, who are more often wives than husbands

Legislature · Misconduct · Political science · Sociology · State (computer science · State law · Statute · Wife · Homicide, Infanticide, and Child Abuse · Law

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