[8] If no such selection is made, the laws of the first state in which the couple had their habitual residence after marriage govern the property.
[10] Not all efforts to deal with and harmonize the matrimonial aspects of private international law take place at the global level or amongst the members of the Hague Conference.
[11] But even with this regulation, which binds all member states save Denmark, within the EU large differences in divorce laws exist.
High-profile divorce cases such as the one between American pop-star Madonna and her British husband Guy Ritchie, must deal with such issues, especially if one party stands to gain by filing in a certain jurisdiction.
(In this case, Ritchie, who is comparatively less well off, would benefit from filing in Britain where settlements tend to be larger and alimony more generous).
The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction was concluded on 25 October 1980 and entered into force on 1 December 1983.
Its goal is to provide that if a child is removed from his habitual residence and custodial status to another country, the child can be returned to the country of his habitual residence thus maintaining the custodial status quo prior to the removal.
For example, although a plain-text reading of the convention seems to support the notion that a child is habitually resident in the state he or she lived in prior to abduction, some courts have disagreed.
For example, in the 2001 case of Mozes v. Mozes where the wife and children had travelled to the United States from Israel for a period of fifteen months with the consent of the father, during which time the wife obtained a divorce and temporary custody of the children in Los Angeles, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that habitual residence can change.
[17] Currently the Convention has signed the entire European Union, plus Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Norway, Ukraine and the United States .
[18] In the message he sent to the United States Senate asking them to ratify the treaty, United States President George W. Bush called on the body to act quickly citing the increasing number of 15 million US child support cases that involved “parties who live in different nations.”[19]