What Does “No Fault” Divorce Mean?

"No Fault," what?

From HuffPost Divorce:

In 1970, the State of California originated the concept of “no-fault” divorce. The rationale behind the law was that there was no point in forcing people to stay in a marriage when they were not happy in it, and that requiring someone to prove legal grounds to dissolve the marriage was not serving any useful purpose. Historically, in order to obtain a divorce one had to prove the existence of legal grounds such as adultery. This often required additional expenses on behalf of the aggrieved party, only serving to make the divorce process more expensive and cumbersome than it already was. In the years leading up to the enactment of “no-fault” divorce, courts often granted divorces on bases that were easier to prove, the most common being “mental cruelty.” In that situation, one spouse would testify that he or she was being subjected to mental stress as a result of the actions of the other spouse. Given that, and given that people simply did not want to be married, there seemed little reason to force them to stay in marriages when grounds could not be established. Over time, the “no-fault” movement expanded to other states, although interestingly it only reached the typically progressive state of New York in 2010.  

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