Hoadley v. Hoadley

Cardozo, Ch. J.

Plaintiff was married to defendant in 1912. He says that she was then a lunatic, “ wholly unable to understand the nature of the contract of marriage and its effects and consequences.” Ignorant, he says, of the lunacy at the time of the marriage, he lived with her for ten years, till the fact of her lunacy was adjudged in appropriate proceedings. In the meantime two children were born of the union. She is now, and for some years 'has been, an inmate of an asylum. He asks that nullity of the marriage be judicially declared.

The appeal brings up the question whether a marriage…