New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1860-04-21
DIVORCE.
To he Hon. HoRLcB 0REKLEY:

lbal also study sIctest brevty. Had your sun
ung up justly presented the question at issue the pub
lie need not have been troubled with mine.
1t Is besettiDg weakness Of our nature TO imagine
itsef unailiDey right its opinions ipfsibly true its
rules of action the only morality. IT. in discussion
of principles, we yield to this the best thing to close
il; becauae conducted in gu ia spirit il becomes
less, or worse.
The sole point in discussion and that which might
be usefply If dispassionatey debated has been this
You advocate divorce law with only cause of
divorce. think it conducive to public morality that
sueh law should admit several causes. / took that
position, and | took no other / indoted the divorce
law Of Indiana; nothing more. But how, in summing
up 90 you state the case In substance thus: Mar
Iiage, under a single cause divorce law, in New
York, is marriage. TheIe is other marriage What
goes by that name, under divorce law admitting sev-
eral caufes in Connecticut Indiana, is not mar
rage, but concubnage. If those who united
under such laws call themselves married, they use
" srds unjusuhably;" they virtually confess the
BADNESS of their cause;" they are as " tradesmen
" who counterfeit snother's trade marks" they are
couDtenal cling the Roman woman who " had eight
husbands within five year,, and appropnating Mr..
GIeeeys word marriage as fg leaf for this sort Of
thing" They muft " choose a new term for their
" arrangement" Horace Greeley, armed with Noah
wisely and nationally pared, but they are not mar
riedj and he protests against their using the
word"
The Law of Come cticut the law of Indiana de.
cla1es that marriage contracted under divorce laws
admitting several causes and by virtue OF which the
union may in certain contingencies, terminate before
DEATH is marriage. Horace Greeley tells US it is
quite another thing" The law Of Connecticut, the
law of Indiana, provides, that if couple, legally
divorced contract second marriage such Sc ,ont mar
rage Is letal. Horace Greeley insets that " they
must not call that marriage, Tor though il may be the
p" tie ssme 20 them, il is far otherwise 10 him."
Here is conflict. TIE Revived Codes of Indiana
and Connecticut and of dozen other States beside
declare thiDg Horace Greeley declares the oppo-
SITE The the Other evident must be grew
ousy in error.
Pcpes, from the Vatican have, not unfrequently,
assumed the power TO certain laws enacted by duly
constituted legal authority in various Catholic coun-
tries, by Papsl Bull 10 override and annul theni Bdtin
our country consider the law supreme; IN force
and be Acknowledged and respected, until i be le-
gally repealed.
Tnis Is lot all. In your summing up, motives are
imputed. Those who enact or approve divorce Law
which admits more than one, are told that
"tEey aIe concerned chiefly for those who, having
" married unfortunately If not viciousy seek relief;
snd that this arises from morbid egotsm the vice
of age, which overrides the gravest social ne
cessities in its mad pursuit OF individual, personal
ends"
Does Il not occur to you that when men vote for
sanction a.ODable divorce laws, they may do 30 from
u
when an opponent expresses the opinion: IN cases
where the hottest purposes for which God ordained
rage frustrated and lts innsst sanctuary de-
filed by evil passions, ought, for the sake OF virtue
{" 10 cease"-thst he may be sincere in that opinion
Have you forgotten that there is One only who looks
into the heart and reads is motives; and that hu
man beng has right, setting himself up as judge and
ruler, TO usurp His place
The story of the horse-thef tod that he was pun
i,hed not merely for his oense bat "hat horses may
" not be stoien if it has any bearing the subject
at all, has An unfair one. demonstrating il crime.
To take for granted that divorce also IS crime, is
to the whole question under discussion Again,
if The meaning be, that the unhappy married should
suffer net merely for their mistake bat that dtDorces
may not be granted then you fall into the same error
as TIE Jews, when they, jealous without knowledge
for their Sabbath, were reminded by Jesus in the
spirit of the truest philosophy, that human institutions
are made for man, not man tor human institutions.
Others may have argued that children ought to be
sacIifced to parents. | hold, aud ever have held,
owe to those to whom we impart existence. 1t is a
misfortune, and great one, that mother should look
her children the eye ana think that their father then
living, and her husband different men. But far
greater is the misfortune when che looks upon them
with the bitter consciousness they are daily, hourly
learning TO know in their father sot brute, ruff
fan, the decorator Of the domestic sanctuary: far
greater ia the anguish 70 feel that that father never
teaches them one lssson of virtue gives them
ore useful example, exceptit be such as the Heots
furnished to the Spartan youth aerrb BILE beacon
ing flon the shame ana the folly of intemperance.
Ii you conclude that divorce laws necessarily cause
Young people to marry readily and heartsssly they
don fresh hat sport he bonnet, you do your fe
lOwcTtatures great mustce aud lev years residence
in Indiana would con vince you of your mistake You
might De reminded OF what even at our age, we ought
not have forgotten-what manner of thing, namely,
youthful affection il; how undoabtngly is believes
how wholly trusts how little it calculates laws
troubles itself about divorce or dreams of anything
except that 1t sha always love 1t loves now
tkn.n At "A ~
an impossible desire. We often err in aScribng TO the
restraining influence of faulty laws that which is due
TO the faithful impulses Of our better nature.
You remind us, on Gibbons authority, that the lib
erty OF divorce grossly abused debauched
Rome. remind you Lat tie Liberty of Republican
isnl was terribly abused in Revolutionary France.
But would be poor argument thence 70 ooncluie,
that, in this county, we ought to forbid divorce and
introduce q monarchy.
The moral and intellectual supremacy of Europe
over Asia you ascribe msinly 10 Christian marriage.
To Christian marriage, opposed TO pOygamy, 1t may
justly be Thus ascfibsd This opinion | myself, in
recent work, expressed: Under the system of mo-
Dogamy alone have mans ply steal powers and moral
attributes ever mantsinei their ascendency, while
weakness ard national decsdepce follow in the tran
"of gsmy, whether openly carried out as in Dsseret
ard Cons,anllDope, or secretly pfactlced as in Lon.
don and Rew.York" 20 Fool falls on The Bound.-
arg Of AhotAer World, page A. Bat this has no
bearing on the divorce question. You will not assert
that the morals better before the Reform In
Catholic countries refusing divorce, than they were
after Luhers time i'll Protestant countries permit
tug it.
Briefly summing up, remind YOU:
i. mat proved and yOu have not even attempted
to dslrove that, according to the Old Testament God
promt gated more than three thousand years ago,
divorce law which permitted husband TO put away
wife Who found no 70, favor in his eyes thai that law
prevailed among Ills chosen people from the time Of
Moses till lpg after joseph and M,ry were united
under s proyisons and consequently that If mar
rage deteImnabe by divorce DO no marriage, there
was not a married man or woman among the Jews
for fifteen hundred years