What Do You Need to Prove in Order to Get a Divorce in Massachusetts?
Not much. Massachusetts is a no-fault divorce state. Historically, you needed to prove some grounds for getting the divorce because we had a public policy that, basically, society wanted to keep the marriage together for various policy reasons, and so you would have to prove that one spouse had abandoned the other spouse, or been abusive, or something to that effect. The law changed, and now, in Massachusetts, all you have to prove is that the marriage is irretrievably broken down with no hopes of reconciliation. That’s not a very difficult thing to prove.
Basically, what it amounts to is, if one spouse wants to get a divorce, it’s going to happen in Massachusetts. The old laws for the grounds abuse, abandonment, etc. are still on the books, although you really don’t gain any advantage in 99% of the cases from alleging that somebody has been abusive or abandoned the family, so most cases that are brought in Massachusetts just allege the no-fault grounds.