CHAP. 1X] DIVORCE AND STATUS 1245
he returned to England so that he could be proceeded against
there, and this case is actually understood to have occurred.
The cases of deviation from the list of prohibited degrees
are also Australian for the most part. In South Australia
the proposal was made in 1860 to legalize marriage with a
deceased wife’s sister, and the reserved Bill was not assented
to; nothing daunted, the Parliament sent it up in 1863 to
meet the same doom ; in 1870 the Bill was again refused the
royal assent, but in 1871 the Imperial Government yielded,
and the Bill was allowed to become law (No. 21). Tasmania
legislated to this effect in 1874 (No. 7), and a Queensland Bill,
to which assent was refused in 1875, was allowed to come
into force in 1877 (No. 25). New South Wales adopted the
principle in 1876 (No. 20), and Victoria enacted it in its Act
No. 453, and the rule was also adopted in Western Australia
68 Vict. No. 11), New Zealand (1880), and Canada (45 Vict.
c.42). Inthe case of Natal before responsible government it
was not approved, despite the precedents of the Australian
cases, on the ground that therewas no real popular demand for
the measure? But in 1892 the Cape enacted, and there was
allowed, an Act (No. 40) to provide for such marriages, and
also to permit of a marriage with any female related to him
in a more remote degree than the sister of his deceased wife,
provided that she was not an ancestor of or descendant from
the wife in question The principle has been extended to
In every self-governing Dominion save Canada divorce courts exist.
In Canada the older provinces, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince
Edward Island (but no divorce has ever taken place there), and British
Columbia have divorce courts. See Wheeler, Confederation Law, pp. 250
seq. ; Senate Debates, 1910-1, Pp. 250 seq. It is interesting to note that
Nova Scotia hy 32 Geo. IL ec. 17 adopted the Scottish rule of desertion
founding a divorce, but this was repugnant to the laws of England, and
violated the commission under which the Assembly and Council legislated,
30 the English law was replaced by 1 Geo. IIL ec. 7. Since 1867 the law
is stereotyped, as the provinces cannot alter, and Canada, which can, will
not because of French Canadian feeling. There is no divorce in Ontario,
Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta, save by Canadian Act.
* Lord Norton, Nineteenth Century, July 1879, pp. 172, 173. See Act
No. 45 of 1898; Parl. Pap., C. 5091, pp. 113-22,
® Since this Act, at any rate, itis not incest to have relations with a wife’s
sister, in the view of the Cape Supreme Court; R. v. Delport, 11C. T. R. 412.
1279°3
