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this post was submitted on 29 Feb 2024
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To stop fathers abandoning the family when the wife gets pregnant and using a loophole to get out of child support.
Last time this came up on Lemmy there was a comment saying that's where the law came from originally.
It doesn't stop you separating during pregnancy, just to complete the divorce you have to wait till after the birth.
How would that time actually prevent the scenario you described? You don't have to be married to be a father.
I think some comments were saying it's because of how laws used to work of assuming (to a certain degree) fatherhood of the husband in a marriage. I.e., in a time before DNA testing, if the father divorces while his wife is pregnant, then once the baby is born he's out of the picture and escaped responsibility, but after the birth, his responsibility as father has to be discussed as part of the divorce settlement. (Other comments in this thread and before, had more detail, and some commenters seemed to have looked things up and know what they're talking about!)
Another comment said it stops the mother from skipping out on the father and denying him joint custody/etc. Again, due to legal frameworks around marriage and family especially from a time before DNA testing. Obviously you (should) still have courts that can get involved to resolve cases that don't fit the normal framework.
Another brought up more detail of just settling the divorce terms appropriately. I know the baby (in some countries at least) is not a legal person until born: so for some other parts of legal structure (other than this divorce issue), people involved can be aware there is a baby on the way, but the law has to wait until the birth to actually account for that new person.
One point I didn't see mentioned, but that I can imagine, is that pregnancy is a time of new stress and much change, which could push one or other partner to divorce rashly and regret it later. As others pointed out, you can still separate, just not finalise the legal divorce. Then after the birth you have time to see if you want to be together as a family again, or if you do indeed want a divorce.