Legal grounds for recognizing a marriage agreement invalid (analysis of judicial practice)

Abstract

The article examines the features of the legal nature and grounds for recognizing a marriage contract as invalid. It has been established that modern family law in Ukraine regulates the institution of a marriage contract in some detail, although it was enshrined in law only in 1992, after amendments to the Marriage and Family Code. First of all, its feature was that it could be concluded only before the official registration of marriage, respectively, came into force from the moment of marriage. In addition, along with the settlement of property relations, the list of which was open, the contract could regulate non-property relations of the spouses. At present, the marriage contract is regulated in more detail by the Family Code of Ukraine and does not provide for the possibility for spouses to establish personal non-property rights in it.
 It is established that according to the provisions of Chapter 10 of the Family Code of Ukraine and Articles 203, 215 of the Civil Code of Ukraine, the grounds for invalidating a marriage contract may be as follows: the content of the contract contradicts the legislation of Ukraine and moral principles of society; the will of one or both spouses during the conclusion of the contract is not free and does not correspond to the internal will; the marriage contract is not aimed at the actual occurrence of the legal consequences caused by it.
 The analysis of judicial practice allowed us to identify the grounds and features that the courts pay attention to when considering cases of recognition of marriage contracts as invalid, in particular: criteria of legality (legality) of the marriage contract; the content should not contradict the very essence of marriage contracts; the expression of the will of both spouses during the conclusion of the marriage contract must be free and correspond to their inner will; the marriage contract must be aimed at the actual occurrence of the legal consequences caused by it; the marriage contract cannot put one of the spouses in an extremely unfavorable financial position.
 It is substantiated that the marriage contract is a bilateral transaction, which has a special subject composition, contains legal restrictions on the subject. The peculiarity of its legal nature is due to the fact that it may give rise to rights and obligations in respect of those family members who are not parties to the contract (for example, in relation to existing or future children). It is proposed to make appropriate changes to Article 103 of the Family Code of Ukraine.