t (41 &
42 Vict. c. 19, s. 3) removed a doubt which was entertained whether
these powers could be exercised if there were no children of the
marriage. In 1860 a very important change was made, having for its
object a practical mode of preventing divorces in cases of connivance
and collusion or of misconduct of the petitioner. It was provided that a
claim of dissolution (a provision afterwards extended to decrees of
nullity) should in the first instance be a decree nisi, which should not
be made absolute until the expiration of a period then fixed at not less
than three, but by subsequent legislation enlarged to not less than six,
months. During the interval which elapsed between the decree nisi and
such decree being made absolute, power was given to any person to
intervene in the suit and show cause why the decree should not be made
absolute, by reason of the same having been obtained by collusion, or by
reason of material facts not brought before the court; and it was also
provided that, at any time before the decree was made absolute, the
queen's proctor, if led to suspect that the parties were acting in
collusion for the purpose of obtaining a divorce contrary to the justice
of the case, might under the direction of the attorney-general intervene
and allege such case of collusion. This enactment (extended in the year
1873 to suits for nullity) was ill drawn and unskilfully conceived. The
power given to any person whomsoever to intervene is no doubt too wide,
and practically has had little or no useful effect as employed by
friends or enemies of parties to a suit. The limitation in terms of the
express power of the queen's proctor to intervene in cases of collusion
was undoubtedly too narrow. But the queen's proctor, or the official by
whom that officer was afterwards represented, has in practice availed
himself of the general authority given to any person to show cause why a
decree _nisi_ should not be made absolute, and has thus been enabled to
render such important service to the administration of justice that it
is difficult to imagine the due execution of the law of divorce by a
court without such assistance. By the Matrimonial Causes Act 1866 power
was given to the court to order an allowance to be paid by a guilty
husband to a wife on a dissolution of marriage. This act also can hardly
be considered to have been drawn with sufficient care, inasmuch as while
it provides that if the husband's means diminish, the al