1. Classification of Impediments
public impediment is too close consanguinity;
a private impediment is coercion. (
b) Diriment and obstructing impediments (
impedimenta dirimentia and
tantum impedientia), according
as the impediment
either renders void the legal status of the marriage,
or, while it exists, merely delays the
proper conditions of its contraction. In case
of the latter, the marriage is simply to be
postponed till they are removed; but if this is
not done, the marriage does not therefore become
invalid, but is at most punishable. In case
of diriment impediments, on the other hand, the
marriage may be annulled if the causes are private,
and must be annulled if the causes are public; but
such annulment must not be construed as divorce,
being merely a declaration of the invalidity or non-existence
of the marriage. Diriment impediments
are, e.g., a previous marriage still existent, and the
impotence or sterility of one of the parties, the
former being a public, and the latter a private, diriment
impediment. Obstructing impediments are
betrothal (
sponsalia de futuro) and the times when
matrimony is forbidden. (
c) Absolute or relative
impediments, according as the cause impedes the
legality of the marriage in general or only between
certain persons. Thus, an absolute impediment is
impuberty, and a relative one is difference in religion.
The various canonical impediments are as follows:
(a
3. Canonical Impediments
not yet twelve years old. The law
both of the Roman Catholic and the
Protestant Church considers this a
public diriment impediment; but in
canon law this holds only when the marriage has
not been
consummated because of the previous development
of puberty. The civil law has every
where raised the age of marriage. (
b) A previous
and still existing marriage of one of the contracting
parties (
impedimentum ligaminis) is a public diriment
impediment, since by its very nature marriage
can exist only between one man and one
woman. Ignorance of the continuance of a former
marriage precludes only the crime of bigamy, but
not the necessary severance of the second marriage,
the latter being a sham marriage which can not be
legalized even by the consent of the injured party
or by a dispensation, since the impediment must be
considered as based upon divine law. (
c) The impediment
which exists in consequence of a still existing
marriage is found by canon law in the reception
of a higher consecration and in the solemn vow of
chastity taken when entering a religious order approved
by the Holy See. (
d) On account of consanguinity
the Mosaic law
(
Lev. xviii. 7 sqq., xx. 17
sqq.;
Deut. xxvii. 20
sqq.) forbids a man to
marry his mother, sister (whether uterine or not),
granddaughter, and paternal or maternal aunt. In
Roman law marriages between relatives in the ascending
and descending lines
are unrestricted, but
wedlock is forbidden between brothers and sisters
(whether uterine or not) and between all collateral
