Incurable insanity and voidable marriages

[MentalHealthIssues123]

What is the name of your state? New York

What does "incurable insanity" mean in the context of getting an annulment in New York. Does the mental illness have to be so severe the person needs to be institutionalized or do conditions like depression and PTSD (which aren't "curable" but can be managed with medication) count?

 

[FlyingRon]

The words "incurable insanity" do not exist in the marriage statute. The words are "incurable mental illness for more than five years."
Note that the details matter. Just because one partner has a mental condition doesn't make the marriage voidable. If a person continues to cohabit with the mentally ill spouse, knowing about the condition, they're not going to be able to get the marriage annulled. You'll have to do a full up divorce.

 

[Taxing Matters]

What does "incurable insanity" mean in the context of getting an annulment in New York. Does the mental illness have to be so severe the person needs to be institutionalized or do conditions like depression and PTSD (which aren't "curable" but can be managed with medication) count?

The law in New York making a marriage voidable based on a spouse being "incurably mentally ill for a period of five years or more" is over a century old and the cases that set the standard for this are thus themselves rather old, setting a well established standard for what must be proven. Most mental conditions will not make a marriage voidable. Rather, what is needed is that the spouse with the mental condition must not have been able to appreciate what it was he or she was doing when he or she entered into the marriage. As the NY Supreme Court, Appellate Division stated:

Before a marriage can be annulled on the ground of lunacy or for want of understanding on the part of one of the parties, it must be shown satisfactorily that such party ‘was mentally incapable of understanding the nature, effect and consequences of the marriage’. There is a presumption of sanity in favor of the validity of a marriage celebrated in due form which should prevail ‘unless it is overcome by proof clear and satisfactory which stands the test of the most careful scrutiny’.​

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Weinberg v. Weinberg, 255 A.D. 366, 369, 8 N.Y.S.2d 341, 345 (App. Div. 1938). An even older case says the same thing. "[It] must be satisfactorily shown that the party in whose interest or right the action is brought was mentally incapable of understanding the nature, effect, and consequences of the marriage." Meekins v. Kinsella, 152 A.D. 32, 36, 136 N.Y.S. 806, 809 (App. Div. 1912).

One spouse having PTSD or indeed most any mental illness is not going to make the marriage voidable. You'll have to get a divorce unless you can prove the spouse with the mental illness was "was mentally incapable of understanding the nature, effect, and consequences of the marriage" when the marriage was formed.

 

[MentalHealthIssues123]

The law in New York making a marriage voidable based on a spouse being "incurably mentally ill for a period of five years or more" is over a century old and the cases that set the standard for this are thus themselves rather old, setting a well established standard for what must be proven.

Thank you, that was great to have explained.

 

[Taxing Matters]

Thank you, that was great to have explained.

You're welcome. I'm glad the information was useful.