Georgia’s no-fault ground changed the public policy that the old collusion rules were built on, but it did not erase them from the code.
The Thirteenth Ground
In 1973 the General Assembly added a thirteenth ground for divorce, now at OCGA 19-5-3(13): “The marriage is irretrievably broken.” No fault has to be shown, and no fault-based defense fits it.
The Courts Said the Policy Had Changed
In Friedman v. Friedman, 233 Ga. 254 (1974), the Georgia Supreme Court granted a divorce on the pleadings where both spouses said the marriage was irretrievably broken, and held that an older decision requiring live testimony “will not be followed because the public policy of this state has been changed with the adoption of the statute providing for divorce on the ground that the marriage is irretrievably broken.”
The court repeated the point in Dickson v. Dickson, 238 Ga. 672 (1977): “The public policy of the state to hinder facility in the procurement of divorces has been amended.”
The Fight Over Divorce Agreements
The consequences were argued out over settlement agreements. In Warren v. Warren, 235 Ga. 234 (1975), a bare majority still voided an agreement traded for an uncontested divorce. Three dissenting justices said that after Friedman such an agreement “should no longer be declared void as against public policy.” A dissent decides nothing, but six years later the court adopted their view and overruled Warren in Sanders v. Colwell, 248 Ga. 376 (1981).
What Survived
OCGA 19-5-4 is still law. It still forbids a divorce where adultery, desertion, cruel treatment, or intoxication “was occasioned by the collusion of the parties.” It simply says nothing about the no-fault ground.
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