| 英文摘要 |
Most American spouses who live apart tend to arrange the consequences of their separate lives with separation agreements. Apart from the traditional rules of denying separation agreements, American legal systems currently admit the validity of separation in terms of respecting autonomy, which demonstrates the privatization of Marriage Law. However, due to the unique nature of separation agreement for its belonging to the family law, the validity of such agreement is subject to special review under U.S. law. When the contents of a separation contract are unfair, it--as opposed to any other contract--is more likely to be invalidated by the court in order to protect fairness. In practice, however, If separation contracts are examined solely by the standard of procedural fairness--whether by means of ordinary contract review fraud and duress or by the traditional family law of “confidential relationship principle,” there will be deficiencies. Also, courts cannot properly review the separation agreements under the substantial fairness standard since they usually rely solely on the procedure fairness standard without actually using the substantial fairness standard. Additionally, in an attempt to promote the freedom of contract, most American courts review separation agreements in a perfunctory way. It is therefore difficult to implement the fairness on separation agreements as American courts tend to hold the validity of separation agreements. This article first explores the theories and the history of the validity separation agreements in the United States, and analyzes the special characters of separation agreements. It then examines the procedure and substantial standards--the core issues on the validity of separation agreements--and discusses the current application of the above standards as well as the difficulties in applying in real cases respectively. Finally, the article provides insight into the related issues in Taiwan and offers suggestions by comparing the differences between the American and Taiwanese law. It is hoped that this article can improve the possible development of the separation agreements.
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