Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1998
ISSN
0029-3571
Publisher
Northwestern University School of Law
Language
en-US
Abstract
One simplified view of contract law is that the state enforces private bargains without looking into the substance of those bargains. From this contractual perspective marriage might look like a contract to exchange services and goods: love, money, the ability to have and raise children, housework, sex, emotional support, physical care in times of sickness, entertainment and so forth. But when the parties to a marriage put these terms in writing, courts only enforce the provisions governing money. This contract/family law rule of selective enforcement disproportionately benefits those who bring more money to a marriage, who are more likely to be men than women.
Recommended Citation
Katharine B. Silbaugh,
Marriage Contracts and the Family Economy
,
in
93
Northwestern University Law Review
65
(1998).
Available at:
https://scholarship.law.bu.edu/faculty_scholarship/1675
Included in
Comparative and Foreign Law Commons, Human Rights Law Commons, Law and Gender Commons, Property Law and Real Estate Commons
