Wild marriage

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Until the second half of the 20th century, the relationship between couples who lived together without being married was regularly referred to as a wild marriage with a derogatory connotation . Lawyers call the partnership of unmarried people living together as a marriage-like community , sometimes also free marriage . In the course of the sexual revolution in the last third of the 20th century, the notion that only married people had the right to engage in sexual activity was called into question. Since then, other forms of sexuality have increasingly appeared legitimate, so that the idea seems absurd to most that relatives who do not live together as an unmarried couple are “wild”.

Until the 1970s, legal prohibitions in Bavaria and individual Swiss cantons prohibited unmarried couples of the opposite sex from living together in a shared apartment. This behavior only became legal with the abolition of this prohibition of cohabitation. In Switzerland, the cohabitation of unmarried people together is as a couple without derogatory intent as concubinage referred.

Situation in Germany

Reasons for partnerships without a marriage license

Many of those who have been blamed or blamed for living in a “wild marriage” regard their way of life as temporary . They took or are claiming the right to first try out living together and only then to marry. After the elimination of criminal sanctions for “ indecent ” behavior, the moral pressure emanating from society to marry was largely reduced to so-called “ must marriages ”. In the present, even pregnancy or the birth of a child together are often no longer considered sufficient grounds for partners in a cohabiting relationship to marry.

During the two world wars and afterwards, financial considerations such as the possible loss of pension entitlements through an official marriage or the vague prospect of the return of a missing partner meant that couples did not intend to marry in principle . As Uncle marriage , the marriage-like cohabitation one was in those times colloquially widow (and her children) referred to a man she did not want to marry for economic reasons, their widow's pension not to lose.

There are cases of couples living together (mostly in secret) in response to prohibitions on marriage . Up until the 1950s, teachers in some parts of Germany were not allowed to marry on the grounds that “the duties of a housewife and mother are incompatible with the work of a teacher”. The coexistence itself or the character of the coexistence (for example of a Catholic priest with his housekeeper) were and are also kept secret by Catholic clergy. Systematic violations of the principle of celibacy that have become known are also known as “wild marriages” .

Ideological reasons for not marrying have existed in anarchist circles influenced by anti-authoritarian ideas since the 19th century. The rejection of church and bourgeois moral concepts is particularly widespread among left-wing liberals . As early as 1908, the anarchist Emma Goldman wrote :

“I believe that the woman's first declaration of independence, when she signs her emancipation, will be that she admires and loves a man for his heart and mind, not for the size of his wallet. The second explanation will be that she has the right to live this love without any obstacles from the outside world. The third and most important declaration will be the absolute right to free motherhood. "

- Emma Goldman : What I Believe (what I think)

Fried potato ratio

In the post-war period in Germany, the term "fried potato relationship" arose for a relationship that was maintained by a man because of "certain external comforts" without any real ties. Some authors see a connection with the effects of the First World War and the relationships of convenience born out of necessity, in which for some men the main concern was the regular supply of hot meals and marriage was not planned from the outset.

The term "fried potato ratio" for this form of coexistence was particularly widespread at the end of the 1940s. The term referred to relationships between returning soldiers and widows who were wildly married to avoid the loss of the widow's pension after World War II .

Legal position

In the Federal Republic of Germany, the landlord of an apartment could be prosecuted for pimping if he rented an apartment to an unmarried couple or a prostitute, or at all if he allowed other fornication in his apartment . Only since the judgment of the Federal Court of Justice of April 17, 1970 (Az. I ZR 124/68) have such rental contracts been recognized under civil law as not immoral and thus effective. It was therefore common to the landlord before signing a lease, for example, the marriage certificate of the couple solicited. Accommodation establishments (e.g. hotels) do not fall under the exception of Section 180 (3), since a hotel room is not a permanent residence. Thus, until 1968 (GDR) or 1973 (Federal Republic of Germany), the owner or employee was liable to prosecution for coupling if they rented a room to an unmarried couple. That is why unmarried couples there often presented themselves as married couples.

In the law of social assistance , such partnerships are considered to be a community of need .

Current use

With the change in sexual morality, primarily as a result of the 1968 movement , these lifestyles were increasingly tolerated and in Germany, as non-marital partnerships, increasingly recognized by law, and in some cases also recognized.

The term wild marriage is still used colloquially to characterize - often without judgmental intent - a partnership without a marriage certificate (a consensual partnership ), sometimes also free marriage . In addition, the term is used in a figurative sense for cooperation without a contractual basis that does not relate to partnerships .

United States

Under US law, there are partnerships in some states called common-law marriage , which some in German-speaking countries would call "wild marriages". In the USA, as in other states where there are regulations on common-law marriage, it is not uncommon for a couple who was neither married by the state nor by a religious community to be unmolested with the claim to liability as " married couple ”.

Web links

Wiktionary: Fried potato ratio  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Anne-Lise Head-König / CN: Concubinat. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  2. Karin von Flüe: Quiz: What do you know about the "wild marriage"? In: Observer.ch . February 9, 2018, accessed June 7, 2020.
  3. Advice: Not only love counts: Wild marriage brings disadvantages. In: n-tv.de . May 14, 2008, accessed June 7, 2020.
  4. Lexicon entry: Onkelehe, die. In: Duden online . Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  5. ^ Josef Ettle: Eichstätt: Teachers had to remain single. In: Donaukurier.de . March 26, 2010, updated January 31, 2017, accessed June 7, 2020.
  6. Emma Goldman : What I Believe. In: New York World. July 19, 1908; German: Anarchism and other essays (=  classics of the social revolt. Volume 22). Edited by Jörn Essig-Gutschmidt. 2nd Edition. Unrast, Münster 2018, ISBN 978-3-89771-920-0 , pp. 17–30 ( online at anarchistischeebibliothek.org).
  7. ↑ Encyclopedia entry: Roast potato ratio, that. In: Duden online . Retrieved June 7, 2020.
  8. Olga Ejikhine: Taken literally: the phrasebook through the world of idioms . Digitalis Books, 2006, ISBN 90-77713-05-0 ( side view in Google book search).
  9. Kirsten Plötz : As if the better half were missing: "Single" women in the early FRG 1949-1969. Helmer, Königstein im Taunus 2005, ISBN 978-3-89741-053-4 , p. 305: footnote 37 (doctoral thesis University of Hannover 2002; view of quotations in the Google book search).
  10. For example, in the wiki entry: Cohabitation similar to marriage or illegitimate partnership - definition, children, custody and maintenance. In: Juraforum.de. 2015, accessed June 7, 2020.
  11. Thomas Walkling: Free marriage. In: Erbrecht-heute.de. 2020, accessed June 7, 2020.