It Takes a Unanimous Vote to Stay Married

The saga of Katie Price (also known as Jordan) and Peter Andre continues. After separating from Andre, hiring England’s most formidable divorce lawyer, and packaging up Andre’s possessions to be placed in storage, Price has now announced that she wants to take Andre back. This twist in the ever-changing story illustrates at least two salient points:

1) People are often impulsive and irrational as they navigate the challenges of a divorce or separation. Who knows whether Ms. Price was wrong to separate from Mr. Andre, or whether she was right to do so at the time and is now wrong to want to take him back? The reason that most states provide a waiting period (Oregon’s is 90 days) between filing for divorce and finalizing a divorce is that people often do change their minds. The court system does not want people taking up judicial resources to make a impactful life decision haphazardly. If it’s a good idea, it’ll be a good idea in three months, and Ms. Price did not even have to wait nearly that long before she came to the conclusion that it might not be.

2) It takes two people to get into a marriage and one to get out. England, like almost every state in the United States, appears to be a no-fault jurisdiction. Simply deciding you don’t want to be married anymore is enough to get divorced in a no-fault jurisdiction. Nothing stopped Ms. Price from separating from Mr. Andre in the first place, no matter what he wanted. By the same token, now that she wants to be reunited with him, that won’t happen unless he decides that he’s in favor of reconciliation. Nothing in the law forces people to be together; both must want the union or it does not happen.