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- Title
No-Fault Divorce Reform in the 1950s: The Lost History of the "Greatest Project" of the National Association of Women Lawyers.
- Authors
Oren, Laura
- Abstract
In the 1950s, the National Association of Women Lawyers ("NAWL") undertook what it considered its "greatest project," the drafting and promotion of a model no-fault divorce law. It launched its campaign at a time when post-war realities and the law in practice were putting increasing pressure on the law on the books which lagged behind contemporary sensibilities. NAWL acted two decades before the no-fault divorce "revolution" of the 1970s. It did so in the 1950s when women were said to be both "domestic" and "quiescent." The Article has three aims. First, it considers NAWL's project as a missing piece in the history of divorce law, the no-fault revolution, and the rise of mass divorce in mid-twentieth century America. Second, it reflects on the implications of NAWL's undertaking for the standard narrative of "domesticity" in the 1950s, an account that has been questioned in recent years. Last, it tells a story of women's activism in the depth of the so-called "doldrums" of the organized women's moveme
- Subjects
UNITED States; NO-fault divorce; WOMEN lawyers; DIVORCE law; LAW reform; WOMEN'S rights; UNITED States social conditions, 1945-
- Publication
Law & History Review, 2018, Vol 36, Issue 4, p847
- ISSN
0738-2480
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1017/S0738248018000172