Purpose; construction.

§ 1502. Purpose; construction. This chapter shall be liberally construed and applied to promote its underlying purposes, which are: (1) To promote the amicable settlement of disputes that have arisen between parties to a marriage; (2) To mitigate the potential harm to spouses and their children caused by the process of legal dissolution of marriage; (3) To make the law of divorce more effective for dealing with the realities of matrimonial experience by making irretrievable breakdown of the marriage relationship the sole basis for divorce; (4) To permit dissolution of a marriage where the marriage is irretrievably broken despite the objections of an unwilling spouse; (5) To award alimony under this chapter to a dependent party but only during the continuance of such dependency; (6) To award alimony in appropriate cases so as to encourage parties to become self-supporting; (7) [Repealed.]59 Del. Laws, c. 350, § 1; 61 Del. Laws, c. 204, § 1; 62 Del. Laws, c. 168, § 1;