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Attempt
observed - obviously greater is the inherent wrongfulness of the act, greater the injury, and greater, therefore, the responsibility:
“Perchè alla violazione del diritto del coniuge abbandonato si aggiunge […] la frode compiuta verso le persona con la quale si contrasse l'illecita unione, il perfido inganno della persona che si induce ad un connubio legalmente nullo”322 .
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Attempt
There has been controversy among text-writers as to whether the crime of bigamy admits of an attempt. Most authoritative writers323 hold that it does. But the great difficulty arises in determining which acts may constitute such attempts. We have already said that the crime of bigamy is completed by the celebration of the second marriage during the subsistence of the previous marriage: the consummation or otherwise of the second marriage is irrelevant: ‘consensus facit nuptias non concubitus’ . Therefore, if the possibility of a criminal attempt is to be admitted, it must be sought in the acts preceding the actual celebration of the second marriage and which constitute a commencement of execution. Sometimes it was held that the publication of the banns, the appointment of the day for the celebration of marriage, the execution of the nuptial deed or marriage settlement, the receipt of the dowry, were a sufficient commencement of execution to constitute a punishable attempt. At other times it was considered that the said acts were merely acts of preparation and, as such, not sufficient to amount to a criminal attempt324. We will not attempt to lay down any hard and fast rule concerning this question: we would only say that, as the essential act of the whole ceremony of marriage is the manifestation of the mutual consent of the parties, it may be perhaps safely said that there would be a punishable attempt in the case in which one of the parties has already pledged his consent by the ritual formula "I will” and the ceremony is frustrated before the act is completed by the
322 Confer Maino, op. cit., art. 360, para. 1555 323 E.g., Carrara, op. cit., para. 1745; Puglia, op. cit., p. 219 324 Confer Maino, op. cit., para. 1554
