Common Themes

Breach of Promise

Two kinds of nineteenth-century lawsuits involving lovers have almost ceased to exist today: the breach of promise suit when the engagement is no longer desired by one of the parties, and the alienation of affection suit when another lover takes one's betrothed or spouse "away." In the nineteenth century, however, women in particular lost a great deal when an engagement did not go forward to the marriage. The greater permissiveness in conduct allowed engaged couples meant that the woman whose engagement was broken carried a sexual taint. Thus, both her good name and her value as a commodity in the marriage market were ruined. Such severe loss often found attempted redress in the breach of promise lawsuit.

Not all breach of promise suits came out of broken engagements, however, as the belief that one was engaged could be equally damaging if the woman had behaved with the license allowed those who planned to marry. Consider the case of the married Mr. Brown who proposed to Elizabeth McKeown, swearing on the Bible he had given her that she would be his wife. He told her that their vow on the Bible was "as good as being married," but when she became pregnant, she found herself ruined. The court agreed with her, awarding damages of $1,250. The case of breach of promise brought by Miss Effie Carstang was more complicated and the stakes much higher. This case went to trial repeatedly with one different outcome after another, a happenstance which illustrates many of the pitfalls of legal efforts to resolve matters of the heart. In an interestingly complex fictional study of breach of promise, Anthony Trollope shows us the outcome of Arabella Trefoil's failed attempt to extract a marriage proposal out of Lord Rufford and the efforts afterwards to repair the damage to her reputation. Charles Dickens writes the ultimate parody of the breach of promise trial in Pickwick Papers when the prosecuting attorney tries to convict Mr. Pickwick of implied promises to wed on the basis of notes to his landlady about what he wanted for dinner!

The conventions of engagement, marriage, and breach of promise raise many issues about the social, moral, and economic value of marriage. Readers may wish to explore more fully the forces that made marriage so much more than a choice between lovers and to think why contemporary practices have changed so radically.