At the fault line: divorce laws divide reformers.

Divorce, an often reviled practice that is blamed for everything from messed-up kids to the impending fall of society, isn't for everyone. But for couples who want to split--for whatever reason--it can be the vehicle to a better life.

The ride, however, can become tortured, in spite of the fact that political leaders in the 1970s sought to ease the way with no-fault divorce laws. Under these laws, a partner who wants a divorce--regardless of what his or her mate wants--can get one, usually by citing irreconcilable differences. Each state has some form of no-fault divorce law on the books, but an effort to "reform the reform" now is gathering steam, according to divorce lawyers, legislators, and advocates on both sides of the issue.

The divorce rate, which climbed steadily beginning in the early 1960s, levered off in the 1980s, according to statistics reported by the University of Wisconsin Center for Demography. About 9 divorces occurred in 1960 for every 1,000 women who were married. The number of divorces increased to about 10 per 1,000 in 1965, 14 in 1970, and 20 in 1975. The peak came in 1980, with about 22 divorces recorded per 1,000, then 21 in 1985 and 20 in 1987, the last year for which statistics were available.

In the past two years, lawmakers in about a dozen states have introduced measures to revise divorce laws. Nearly all of these politicians want to make breaking up harder to do.

"The reform movement is perceived to be a monolithic approach by the religious right to inject family values into society," said Sandra Murphy, president of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, which is based in Chicago. But, she said, in some states the reform may have conservative backing and, in others, liberal and conservative backing. "The reform efforts really cut across all political and social lines."

The first no-fault divorce bill became law in California in 1969. Most states followed suit within a few years.

"The reformers of that time were holding up for our view the problem of the loveless marriage," said David Blankenhorn, president of the Institute for American Values, an education and research organization in New York. "Requiring fault grounds for divorce forced people who weren't adversaries into an adversarial position. In 1969, the thinking was that if we give people easier access to divorce, it will be easier for couples to get out of unhappy marriages. The attitude was, `Pursue happiness through second chances.' It reflected a kind of optimism about the future."

But Blaukenhorn said no-fault laws have actually had the opposite effect. "Twenty-five years into this, you can see it's not a good thing. There are a lot of people who believe that we'd all be happier and better off with new reform."

Blankenhorn testified before a Michigan legislative committee in May, advocating for changing that state's divorce laws. The Michigan bill remains in a House committee. A Mississippi reform bill died in committee in February.

Bills to change no-fault divorce laws have been introduced in Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Virginia, Washington, and West Virginia, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, which tracks these bills. Many of the measures require proof of fault or extended waiting periods before a divorce is granted. Some seek to stem the divorce rate by encouraging stronger marriages through mandatory premarital counseling and marital preparation courses for junior high and high school students. Some states have already passed laws that allow fault grounds to be considered in the division of assets from the marriage but not for the divorce itself.

Blankenhorn said the unintended consequence of no-fault divorce laws has been "unilateral divorce on demand." He believes that society, through its laws, "must give more power and dignity to the spouse who is remaining true to the contract--the one who wants to keep the marriage promise--not reflexively bless whoever wants the divorce."

But critics of the measures question why anyone would want to make a difficult process more gut-wrenching.

"Aside from the acrimony and legal costs that would result, the most that reform might do is delay court decisions on child support and custody and distribution of the assets," said Larry Burnpass, a sociologist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

"I see no advantage to that because it would work to the detriment of women and children, and that certainly isn't profamily," Bumpass said. "The movement toward divorce law reform represents the opinion of a rather small but highly mobilized minority that is trying to move the nation into a conservative direction on family matters."

Joseph DuCanto, a Chicago divorce lawyer for the past 41 years, said no-fault laws have tended to help women who are in abusive marriages. But he said the laws have hurt women economically because "we've given them the right to property but taken away long-term alimony. In the past half-dozen years, I would say there has been a judicial swing--not a wholesale stampede--toward granting short-term alimony.

"I've seen too many women pauperized by their free-wheeling husbands" who, after divorce, continue to have successful careers and satisfying personal lives, DuCanto said.

DuCanto, however, does not suggest that returning to a "previously tried and rejected system" will make divorce fair. "The best thing to do is to try to extract what is good from both reform systems and come up with a merger of the two."

Murphy, of the matrimonial lawyers' group, said the "true reformers" are those who use mediation and arbitration to diminish the acrimony, high cost, and long delays in divorce proceedings.

"The ironic part is that some of the people who argue against no-fault divorces are also the ones who complain about the length and cost of litigation," Murphy said.

"Most experienced practitioners in this area of law don't think this sort of reform would serve the public. The government can't legislate for someone to be happy in a marriage."

Reform proponents suggest that the 1970s legislation was the fuel that fired a surge in the divorce rate at that time. "Some will argue that changes in the laws don't affect the divorce rate, but for a long time there has been a chorus of denial about what is really a self-evident truth," Blankenhorn said. "Most people seem to believe that corporations are affected if there are changes in the law, and government programs are affected if there are changes in the law, but somehow the divorce rate is not affected if there's a change in the law?"

Bumpass countered that the swelling of the divorce rate was already well under way beginning in the early 1960s. "And for most of the period since--from 1980 on--the level has been flat.

"What happened was that the legal system accommodated to the social reality" of an increase in divorce, not that the switch to no-fault caused the increase, Bumpass said. "Would there be a reduction in divorces if fault grounds were implemented? I don't think so. Marriages end when people say they end."