It would be difficult [says Lecky] to overstate the extravagance of language employed. . . . One gentleman [Lord Hatherley], who had been Lord Chancellor of England, more than once declared that if marriage with a deceased wife’s sister ever became legal "the decadence of England was inevitable," and that for his part he would rather see 300,000 Frenchmen landed on the British coasts.¹

The bill repealing the law was first adopted by the House of Commons in 1850 but became a law only in 1907, and this act contains a proviso justifying the clergy in refusing to solemnize a marriage with a deceased wife’s sister, and also preserves a feature of the Matrimonial Causes Act of 1857 which defines adultery with a wife’s sister as "incestuous adultery."

¹Lecky, W.E. H.n/an/an/an/a, , 2: 221.