Topic summary
Legal capacity
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Capacity (law).
Legal capacity
Standardized classes of person have had their freedom restricted. These limitations are exceptions to the general policy of freedom of contract and the detailed human and civil rights that a person of ordinary capacity might enjoy. For example, freedom of movement may be modified, the right to vote may be withdrawn, etc. As societies have developed more equal treatment based on gender, race and ethnicity, many of the older incapacities have been removed. For example, English law used to treat married women as lacking the capacity to own property or act independently of their husbands (the last of these rules was repealed by the Domicile and Matrimonial Proceedings Act 1973, which removed the wife's domicile of dependency for those marrying after 1974, so that a husband and wife could have different domiciles).