Rhode Island § 15-5-2 § 15-5-2. Additional grounds for divorce.

Rhode Island Statutes

§ 15-5-2 — § 15-5-2. Additional grounds for divorce.

Rhode Island § 15-5-2

Title 15Domestic Relations

Ch. 15-5Divorce and Separation

This text of Rhode Island § 15-5-2 (§ 15-5-2. Additional grounds for divorce.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Rhode Island primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook

R.I. Gen. Laws § 15-5-2 (2026).

Text

§ 15-5-2. Additional grounds for divorce.
Divorces from the bond of marriage shall also be decreed for the following causes:
(1) Impotency;
         
(2) Adultery;
         
(3) Extreme cruelty;
         
(4) Willful desertion for five (5) years of either of the parties, or for willful desertion
            for a shorter period of time in the discretion of the court;
         
(5) Continued drunkenness;
         
(6) The habitual, excessive, and intemperate use of opium, morphine, or chlora

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§ 15-5-2. Additional grounds for divorce.

Divorces from the bond of marriage shall also be decreed for the following causes:

(1) Impotency;

(2) Adultery;

(3) Extreme cruelty;

(4) Willful desertion for five (5) years of either of the parties, or for willful desertion for a shorter period of time in the discretion of the court;

(5) Continued drunkenness;

(6) The habitual, excessive, and intemperate use of opium, morphine, or chloral;

(7) Neglect and refusal, for the period of at least one year next before the filing of the petition, on the part of the husband to provide necessaries for the subsistence of his wife, the husband being of sufficient ability; and

(8) Any other gross misbehavior and wickedness, in either of the parties, repugnant to and in violation of the marriage covenant.

Legislative History

G.L. 1896, ch. 195, § 2; P.L. 1902, ch. 971, § 1; G.L. 1909, ch. 247, § 2; G.L. 1923, ch. 291, § 2; G.L. 1938, ch. 416, § 2; G.L. 1956, § 15-5-2; P.L. 1975, ch. 287, § 1.