2. Christian and civil marriage

The Christian Marriage Act provides for a marriage in church. The Civil Marriage Act provides for a marriage before a registrar, and it is to be read as one with the Christian Marriage Act. Both apply throughout the country. Before 1965 a person whose personal law was customary could marry under the Christian Marriage Act only after banns, and could not marry under the Civil Marriage Act at all. The Christian Marriage (Amendment) (No. 2) Act 1965 and the Civil Marriage (Amendment) (No. 2) Act 1965 put that person on the same footing as everyone else. Natives may now marry by banns or by licence, and they may marry before a registrar.

The formal path is notice, then either banns or a licence or a registrar's certificate. For a registrar's certificate one party must have resided in the district for at least fifteen days. The party must declare that any consent the law requires has been obtained, and that there is no impediment of kindred or affinity and no other lawful hindrance. A person whose consent is required, and who has not given it, may enter a caveat. The marriage is celebrated by an authorised minister or by the registrar, in the true names of the parties, before two witnesses. Failure to register the marriage afterwards does not, by itself, invalidate it.

The engagement, called a gage, or in Creole a "put stop", is the promise to marry. For a Christian or civil marriage it is a simple contract. There must be offer, acceptance, consideration, intention, and capacity. Mutual promises are the consideration. The promise may be oral, but no action lies unless the plaintiff's evidence is corroborated by some other material evidence. Silence is not corroboration unless a denial would have been expected at once. Williams v Macfoy is the local illustration. A letter to the plaintiff's mother, "I shall marry her", and a later admission of the promise, were enough.

An infant may sue on a promise to marry. An infant may not be sued. A ratification after full age of a promise made in infancy gives no cause of action. A fresh promise, made after full age, does. A promise by a person who is already married is illegal, unless it is a fresh promise made after a decree nisi, which is Fender v Mildmay. A promise given only in return for sexual intercourse is illegal. Affirming it later does not cure it. That is Macfoy v Reffell.

Section 29 of the Christian Marriage Act bars any suit to compel the celebration. The remedy is damages. There is no specific performance. General damages cover injured feelings and the loss of the status of a married woman. Berry v Da Costa is the authority for injured feelings. The defendant's means, and the plaintiff's prospects, go to the amount. Special damages cover money spent in contemplation of the marriage: the ring, the dress, the furniture. Whether the cost of maintaining a child of the engagement can be recovered as special damages was never decided. The proper claim for the child is an affiliation order, not a claim in the breach action. Taylor v Davies shows how unwilling a Sierra Leone judge can be to give more than nominal general damages. Kingsley J said that, even if the plaintiff had succeeded, she had escaped a disastrous marriage.

A defendant is not in breach if, before the writ, he offered to marry and she refused, or if she is unfit to marry by a moral or physical infirmity, or if the contract has been discharged. Whether insanity is a defence is doubtful, because insanity is not a ground of divorce. Gifts made in contemplation of the marriage are not clearly recoverable. Cole v Macauley left the point open. There is no Sierra Leone equivalent of the English Act of 1970, which abolished the action.

No action for breach of promise lies in respect of a Mohammedan marriage. A customary betrothal can be broken without that action. The Local Court has no jurisdiction over seduction or breach of promise. A magistrate has none either.