question: Why do men going through a divorce have to split half of whatever they own and where did that practice originate?
comment: That's not an actual law. When people divorce they will decide either amongst themselves or through a civil process who gets what. They don't just automatically split everything down the middle. However, married people have shared property. That means anything you own is now equally your spouse's property. If you split up and neither person will agree on who gets what, the court may very well just split everything evenly.
passages: Division of property
  
  Division of property, also known as equitable distribution, is a judicial division of property rights and obligations between spouses during divorce. It may be done by agreement, through a property settlement, or by judicial decree.
  
  Distribution of property is the division, due to a death or the dissolution of a marriage, of property which was owned by the deceased, or acquired during the course of the marriage. 
  
  Section::::United Kingdom law.
   The community property concept originated in civil law jurisdictions but is now also found in some common law jurisdictions. Division of community property may take place by item by splitting all items or by values. In some jurisdictions, such as California, a 50/50 division of community property is strictly mandated by statute so the focus then shifts to whether particular items are to be classified as community or separate property. In other jurisdictions, such as Texas, a divorce court may decree an "equitable distribution" of community property, which may result in an "unequal division" of such. In non-community property states property may be divided by equitable distribution. Generally speaking, the property that each partner brings into the marriage or receives by gift, bequest or devise during marriage is called separate property (not community property). See division of property. Division of community debts may not be the same as division of community property. For example, in California, community property is required to be divided "equally" while community debt is required to be divided "equitably".
   Such "divorces" were not always permanent. In 1826 John Turton sold his wife Mary to William Kaye at Emley Cross for five shillings. But after Kaye's death she returned to her husband, and the couple remained together for the next 30 years.
   According to Bakhtiar, a 'divorce for a consideration' is called a "khul" (according to Howard, her release" is "by the form called "chol"") and, by 4 out of 5 schools of thought, a variety of wordings, both explicit and implicit, may be used to pronounce such a divorce, such as "al-khul", the Jafaris also accepting "al-talaq", the Hanafi and Shafii schools accepting "al-bay", meaning 'to sell', and Hanafis accepting "al-shira", meaning 'to purchase'.
  
  Bakhtiar says the schools of thought are followed in certain countries and regions:
  
  BULLET::::- Hanafi in Turkey, Pakistan, and India
  
  BULLET::::- Hanbali in Syria and Arabia
   Equitable distribution is not the same as equal distribution. For example, upon dissolution of a marriage in which the wife served as a stay-at-home mother for a substantial portion of the marriage, a court may award the wife a more-than-50% share of distributed property as advance compensation for her projected need to return to the work force at a lower wage than she would have been able to command had she spent her time developing outside-the-home work experience rather than laboring inside the home.
   While technically property was divided into separate property and community property upon solemnizing of the marriage, early settlers often had no separate property, or brought plots of land that were virtually worthless into their marriages and reaped the benefit of such land only after years of combined labour. Thus, in practice, much separate property was incorporated into the marital community to avoid future disputes about added values and so forth. Even in subsequent generations, when land was more developed and children each inherited a portion of the family estate, inheritances of family land were often treated as movable property and therefore incorporated into subsequent marital communities, complicating patterns of inheritance and linking families together in intricate ways.
   Most community property states start with the presumption that community assets will be divided equally, whereas "equitable distribution" states presume fairness may dictate more or less than half of the assets will be awarded to one spouse or the other. Commonly, assets acquired before marriage are considered individual, and assets acquired after, marital. Depending on the state, an equitable or equal division of assets is then sought.
   Scottish herald Thomas Innes of Learney mentioned abatements in marital situations: "The law of arms provides for abating the arms of an adulterer by two gussets sanguine, and where the bearing of arms is necessary this, and one gusset (they will be close-gussets) for non-adulterous divorcees, are, at least in Patents, applied in the case of divorcees."
   If property is held as community property, each spouse technically owns an undivided one-half interest in the property. This type of ownership applies to most property acquired by each spouse during the course of the marriage. It generally does not apply to property acquired prior to the marriage or to property acquired by gift or inheritance during the marriage. After a divorce, community property is divided equally in some states and according to the discretion of the court in the other states.
   Section::::During the fundamentalist split (early 1950s).
   The implications of the Custom regarding property were particularly important for widows. Under the Custom, the surviving spouse (husband or wife) had a right to half of the marital community property, but the deceased's separate property acquired prior to the marriage as well as the other half of the community property was inherited by the couple's children. Marriage contracts, however, often specified the conditions of inheritance for a widow in such a way that their financial future was prioritized over that of the family as a whole.
   States vary in their rules for division of assets. Some states are "community property" states, others are "equitable distribution" states, and others have elements of both. Most "community property" states start with the presumption that community assets will be divided equally, whereas "equitable distribution" states presume fairness may dictate more or less than half of the assets will be awarded to one spouse or the other. Commonly, assets acquired before marriage are considered the property of the individual and not marital property. and assets acquired after, marital. Attempt is made to assure the welfare of any minor children generally through their dependency. Alimony, also known as "maintenance" or "spousal support", is still being granted in many cases, especially in longer-term marriages.
   In England & Wales, partners in or out of marriage can agree how the joint and severally hold assets will be divided without the intervention of the courts. Where agreement cannot be reached, the courts may be asked to determine a fair and equitable division. The case of Miller v Miller gave the wife a considerable proportion of the husband's recent gains resulting from dealings in the City even though the marriage was short lived.
  
  Section::::United States law.
   After marriage, a wife could bar her right to dower by a fine being levied. This meant that in practice, jointures could also be created by a post-nuptial settlement, provided the wife was willing. Wives (or their relatives on their behalf) often paid their husband a lump sum (known as a portion) or otherwise handed over her property to him, in exchange for a jointure (usually being more than a third) being settled on her for life. This might (in practice) be in the form of a share of the whole property or the right to a particular part of it or an annuity from it.
   According to George Elliott Howard, as published in 1904, "if dissatisfied with his wife, the young Gallinomero of [California] ... may 'strike a bargain with another man' and sell her 'for a few strings of shell-money. Also according to Howard, as published in 1904, "among the California Yurok 'divorce is very easily accomplished at the will of the husband, the only indispensable formality being that he must receive back from his father-in-law the money which he paid for his spouse.'
   Sales became more common in the mid 18th century, the result of husbands being abroad in the military, navy, or being transported to the colonies. It was commonly believed that an absence of 7 years constituted a divorce, so when the first husband returned to find his wife had a new family, the dilemma was solved by the first husband selling his wife in the market place for a nominal sum. It was not recognised as legal, as one wife had to wait for her first husband to die before being able to marry the father of her children. She was given away by her grandson.
   By 1916, the U.S. led the world in number of divorces. In populous New York State, where adultery was the easiest grounds for divorce, attorneys would provide a package consisting of a prostitute and a photographer, with whose product divorce could be obtained. Significant numbers of divorce seekers went to the cities on the Mexican side of the Mexico-U.S. border, or to Haiti, where they found welcoming attorneys, who sometimes advertised in the U.S. The prevalence of the practice is reflected in the song "Haitian Divorce," by Steely Dan.
   "Bird's nest custody" is an uncommon form of joint physical custody in which, rather than having the children go from one parent's house to the other parent's house, the parents move in and out of the house in which the children constantly reside. The goal of this arrangement is to shift the burden of upheaval and moving between homes onto the parents rather than the children. However, due to the high cost of maintaining three households, one for each parent and one for the children, it's rarely a viable option in a custody case.
  
  Section::::Joint physical custody.:Advantages.
   The federal "Divorce Act" of 1968 standardized the law of divorce across Canada and introduced the no-fault concept of permanent marriage breakdown as a ground for divorce as well as fault-based grounds including adultery, cruelty and desertion.
   As of 1860, 14 states had passed some version of this statute. By the end of the Civil War, 29 states had passed some version of a Married Women's Property Act.
   Sometimes, an "a mensa et thoro" separation is used when one partner is claimed to be emotionally, verbally, or physically abusive, keeping the marriage in existence while the two spouses are physically separated. This physical separation may give the two of them a chance to work out the problems in their relationship while residing in legally sanctioned separate dwellings. Spouses may also request an "a mensa et thoro" separation to protect themselves from accusations of desertion or abandonment—such as in cases where one must depart from the other for an extended period of time.
  
  Section::::In specific countries.
  
  Section::::In specific countries.:Canada.
   Divorce law in the U.S. was based on English Common Law, which developed at a time when a female gave up her personal property rights on marriage (see Coverture). Upon separation from marriage, the husband retained the right to the wife's property, but, in exchange, had an ongoing responsibility to support the wife after dissolution of the marriage. British law was amended by legislation including Married Women's Property Act 1870 and Married Women's Property Act 1882 which reformed females' property rights relating to marriage, by, for example, permitting divorced females to regain the property they owned before marriage.
   Section::::History and practice.:Babylon.
   Throughout the history of New France, peasant farmers increasingly disposed of their property while they were still living so transmission of land through the female line had practically disappeared by the end of the 18th century. Truly egalitarian distributions of land had been possible and occurred in the early period because farmers were often able to acquire huge tracts of land, with the express intention of providing future farms for a large family. However, sons were prioritized over daughters despite the Custom’s equitable inheritance principles.
   Khulʿ is a contractual type of divorce that is initiated by the wife. It is justified on the authority of verse 2:228:
  
presuppositions: Men have to split all of their things in a divorce. Men who are divorcing have to split half of their possessions.
corrections: They don't always have to, they can decide who keeps what and split it amicably. When people divorce they decide how things are split; it does not have to be 50/50.
raw_presuppositions: Men have to split all of their things in a divorce. Men who are divorcing have to split half of their possessions.
raw_corrections: They don't always have to, they can decide who keeps what and split it amicably. When people divorce they decide how things are split; it does not have to be 50/50.