Abstract
Our question becomes what happens to a strictly monogamous regime when a State promulgates full birth-status rights for non-marital children. Between 1972 and 2009, France did just that. It legislated full birth-status rights for all. This was done in two main phases. In 1972, all children born from simple concubinage (no partner is further married elsewhere) were granted full birth-status rights. If we adhere to our British anthropology definition of marriage as an intimate conjunction providing its progeny with full birth-status rights, this transformed all monogamous concubinal conjunctions into marriages. They could have been comparable to common law marriage in North America. But it was not to be. French modern concubinage, called “free union,” was legislated as comprising no reciprocal rights and no obligation of sexual faithfulness between partners. From then on, an unmarried man could have children with full birth-status rights from two different unmarried women. An unmarried woman could live with two unmarried men and give them children with full birth-status rights. From this materialized a freedom for French citizens to actually practice either polygyny or polyandry. Now, children born from adulterous conjunctions remained deprived of full birth-status rights and, thus, full-fledged polygamy remained impossible for married men or women. However, starting in 2001, after pressures from the European Court of Human Rights, adulterine children were finally given full birth-status rights equal to those of their half-siblings born from their parents’ certified marriages. As a result, married women and men are now given the possibility to practice either true polyandry or polygyny. The next chapter examines what occurred in the rest of Europe and in the Americas.
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Notes
- 1.
See Rapport au Président de la République relatif à l’ordonnance no 2005–759 du 4 juillet 2005 portant réforme de la filiation (NOR: JUSX0500068P), Journal officiel de la République Française (JORF) no 156 du 6 juillet 2005, page 11155, texte no 18. Available at: http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000000262516&dateTexte= (retrieved Jan. 22, 2009).
- 2.
Referring to two other sources, Terré and Fenouillet (2005: 605) claim that a concubine does not have the right to bear the name of her male concubine. However, their sources are pre-1972 (see their footnote 6) while Berthon and Hartwig’s are post-1972. Moreover, to bear one’s “married” name is not an obligation and more like the granting of a privilege by the husband (or today, the male concubine) and not a right in the full sense of the term. Weill and Terré (1983: 45) use the expression droit d’usage personnel adding that it is not transferable. In 1970, the case has been decided by the président du tribunal de grande instance de Saint Etienne, who wrote that a husband may, for personal reasons, even during his marriage, prohibit his certified wife from bearing his patronym. See Ordonnance du Président du Tribunal de Grande Instance de Saint-Étienne, (ordonnance de référés, 2 mars 1970), Durafour c/dame Blomer. At http://carlscoaching.over-blog.com/article-28625666.html (retrieved Dec. 22, 2011). I remember the case as follows. In early 1970, a well-established conservative politician sued his wife who was campaigning for a left-wing party against him. He asked the court that she be forbidden to use his well-known last name (her married name of many years) during her campaign. His request was accepted as legal.
- 3.
See La documentation française, 5 août 2004, Réf.: F1433. The official blank form for such a certificate states the following: “I, the undersigned, FIRST AND LAST NAME, living at FULL ADDRESS, swear to be living maritally (or in free union) with FIRST AND LAST NAME living at the same address at ADDRESS.” As is the case for a certified marriage, both partners and two witnesses must sign the document.
- 4.
See: Trésor de la langue française at: http://atilf.atilf.fr/dendien/scripts/tlfiv5/advanced.exe?8;s=3943996770 (retrieved Feb. 26, 2009);
- 5.
Berthon and Hartwig 1994: 114. See also the catholic newspaper La Croix dated January 15, 2008 at http://www.la-croix.com/article/index.jsp?docId=2326072&rubId=4076 (retrieved Feb. 27, 2009).
- 6.
See Commission nationale consultative des droits de l’homme (CNCDH), Étude et propositions: la polygamie en France (texte adopté en assemblée plénière le 9 mars 2006): at http://www.annuaire-au-feminin.net/rapportPOLYGAMIEfrHostalier.doc (retrieved Feb. 28, 2009). Whereas prior to 1993 France allowed polygynous household from abroad to migrate to France it has since made it a crime punishable by a 1-year jail term and a 45,000 euros fine. For the United States, see Nina Bernstein, “In secret, polygamy follows Africans to N.Y.” New York Times, March 23, 2007.
- 7.
See Michael Houseman, “Le mariage (mafungidzo/arusi). A propos de la polygamie à Mayotte”, Zangoma 6, 2006, pp. 16–18.
- 8.
French original: “Ces dispositions [successorales] ne constituent pas une discrimination fondée sur la naissance—et comme telle interdite par le droit européen—car elles sont liées au principe d’ordre public de notre droit selon lequel le mariage a un caractère monogamique et visent seulement à protéger le conjoint et les enfants [légitimes] de l’adultère”. In Terré and Fenouillet 2005: 666, n 3.
- 9.
Bernard Vareille, “L’enfant de l’adultère et le juge des droits de l’homme”. Paris: Recueil Dalloz, 2000, p. 626. Available at Recueil Dalloz © Editions Dalloz 2011, http://actu.dalloz-etudiant.fr/fileadmin/actualites/pdfs/SEPTEMBRE_2011/D2000-626.pdf (retrieved Dec. 23, 2011).
- 10.
“Tirant les conséquences de l’égalité de statut entre les enfants, [l’ordonnance du 4 juillet 2005] procède à la suppression formelle des notions de filiation légitime et naturelle, autour desquelles était articulé le titre VII [du code civil]. Par voie de conséquence la légitimation [des enfants] est, elle aussi, supprimée” (emphasis added). In “Rapport au Président de la République relatif à l’ordonnance no 2005–759 du 4 juillet 2005 portant réforme de la filiation (NOR; JUSX0500068P)”. Journal de la République Française no 156 du 6 juillet 2005 page 11155, texte no 18. At: http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000000262516&dateTexte= (retrieved March 1, 2009).
- 11.
Fortunately, this did not prevent Madame Mitterrand from also taking advantage of opportunities life offered her, as she later disclosed, tongue in cheek, in a T.V.A. interview in Québec when asked about the gallivanting of her late famous husband. (One would expect nothing less from this remarkable woman who could love and respect her certified husband while taking the liberty of living her own freedom).
- 12.
See also “Filiation”. Dictionnaire du droit privé français par Serge Braudo, Conseiller honoraire à la Cour d’appel de Versailles. At http://www.dictionnaire-juridique.com/moteur.php (retrieved Jan. 19, 2013).
- 13.
Starkweather at: http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/anthrotheses (retrieved Jan. 20, 2013).
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Legros, D. (2014). Legislating Polygyny and Polyandry in Mainstream France. In: Mainstream Polygamy. SpringerBriefs in Anthropology(), vol 2. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8307-6_5
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