Morning journal and courier., 1881-04-11
Marriage and Divorce.

1Leetinx Under the Auspices of the New England Divorce Reform Lsagues \ --Addtesses By Reyss. ". bike ofssvdr-s.
 mont and pr. BReO1A-DAvOrces iMNeW
 England. t'
 A large audience attended the service at
 Center church last evening, held under the
 auspices of the New England Divorce Re
 form League, of which ex-President Woolsey of Yale is president. President Porter off,
 fered prayer. Rev. Dr. Bacon introduced
 the principal speaker of thsaevenings Rsxsa
 s. W. Dike, of Royalton, Vt.
 Dr. Bacon said that for three or four years
 past there had been a-movement in this State
 to revise the laws-in relation to husband and
 wife. Clergymen of almost all Christian de-
 nominations were associated in this, reform
 including the Roman Catholic, from which Church a committee had been appointed to
 cooperate with a committee from Protestant
 denominations. The Bishop of the Protest
 ant Episcopal Church was himself amember
 of the committee and gives the movement
 hearty cooperation, as do also the clergy of
 that Church, and as do the clergy of all Christian denominations, Methodist, Baptist. Universalist, etc. It is not @ movement Of any one religious body, but common to all religious bodies that acknowledge the New
 Testament. Similar movements have been
 in progress in other New England States with regard to the increase of divorces Other States were not much better than Con- necticut in the matter. The need of a reform led few months ago to the formation of the | New England Divorce Reform League, an as | sociation of comparatively few gentlemen,
 some in each New England State, for the
 purpose of moving the public mind by pub I lie addresses and public meetings, with a view to the reform of the laws of the States with regard to the sanctity and permanence of the marriage relation. Ex-President Woolsey is president of the association. In
 Massachusetts one of the vice presidents IS
 Governor Long; another in Maine is ex-Gov- ernor White. We need not go further to show you that the movement has weight, force and character, and am glad to see be- fore me so many men of weight, and have | now the pleasure of introducing to you Rev. Mir. Dike, of Vermont, who has given special l attention to the subject. .--t zras Mir. Dike in opening said his remarks were l 8 lecture which he recently delivered in Bos- ton The subject, he need not say, was one of great moral importance. A moral leprosy
 was around us. Two words were most sig ni6cant in American life, "home" and sbusi- l ness" The speaker quoted Sir John Mack l intosh as to the great importance of property and the marriage relation to thesocial fabric On them rests the whole order of civil life
 The sanctity of the marriage relation is a fun
 damental principle of human soeiety--the
 basis of civilization. President Hayes said ! that the sanctity of the marriage and the l family relation are the corner stone of Amer | ican society and civilization. Divorce in New England was 8 sort of Yankee notion, and appeared to be indigenous to the soil of | Connecticut. Let us take neither pessimis- l tic nor an optimistic view of the case, 1 with New England courage that confronts evil to remedy it. What are the facts 2 Ben I jamin TrumbulI in 1799 mourned that there ! had been 489 divorces in the last century, all | but 50 of them in the previous fifty years President Dwight mourned that there was | one divorce to every 100 nnarriages-this at \ the time of the French revolution.
 In 1943, habitual intemperance and intoler- able cruelty were added as legal grounds for l divorce. Later came the omnibus clause, D
 making 9 causes for divorces In the year | it passed there were 129 divorces. In 1864 there were 426. Then for 15 years they | averaged 446 annually. Rhode Island last | year granted 246-aI but of the petitions entered. New Haven printed no statistics, | but there were 159 divorces in 1870, 240 in | 1875, 241 in 1878. Maine in 1878 granted | 478 divorces and last year 51O.
 Now take Massachusetts, That State fol- ! lowing the English method formerly granted 1 divorce for two causes. In 1860 there were ! 243 dvorces. Later the causes for divorce ! became 9. In '66 there were 292 divorces i;
 in TO, 449 in '78, 600. The ratio between ! marriages and divorces, the speaker showed was constantly increasing in favor of the di- l vorces. In '78 there were 47S divorces in ! Maine, in Vermont 197, Massachusetts 600, | Connecticut 407, Rhode Island 246 in short
 a total of ,, 113 in New England, larger ra-
 tio in proportion to marriage than in France at the time of the revolution, where the ratio | was 1 divorce to 15O marriages, Belgium 1 l to 270, England (both for divorce and | separation) 1 in BOO The speaker showed | that where the ratio in New England was
 lessened somewhat it was by the Catholic 1 marriages Divorce statistics in the West l were given. Few States west of Ohio collect | ed statistics. In Ohio, however, divorces | were as to %, but now it stood 1 in IS. Indiana is improving her record. No city has been more famed for divorces than Chi l cago, but she had improved, and New Haven was now worse for divorces than Chicago.
 | Loose laws and corrupt practice do not &C., count for the alarming prevalence of divorce. l Excuse me a moment,'' said judge to a | minister. He stepped away, and returning | in three minutes said to the clergyman s'Do I you know what I have done? have di- | vorced 8 couple in less time than you ever married one" -....... -.e ss... Z. l There is daughter in prosperous family | who has been divorced from three husbands, | s, o,,I T while she married fourth husband and since this lecture was written, it is fact, the | fourth has turned out of doors and will prob | ably get divorce. (Laughter) These di- vorces may add, are all granted in one county in this State. . Young people have been known to have agreed before marriage to get divorce, if | they proved uncongenial and we have heard of marriages on trial. Many divorces are obtained collusively. The claim that facility of divorce lessens Iicentiousness is fallacious. Let us take | Massachusetts with her admirably collected and collated statistics. For the 20 years ending in 1879 the population increased 45 per cent In 1860 there were 12, fo4 mar riages in that State, the largest number ever known up to that time The speaker showed by figures that licentious crimes had increas- ed far more in proportion than other crimes despite the facility of getting divorces.
 
 obtaining letters from 200 different promi- nent gentlemen in different sections of New England. The burden of this correspon- dence strongly sustained the speakers claim that licentiousness was not 1essened by easy
 divorce laws, but rather increased. He quoted a prominent French authority who criticised American facility of divorce, and
 quoted also from ex-President Woolsey and
 from the report of c. D, Rice, statistican
 of the bureau of labor of Massachusetts, to
 General Walker, of the census bureau, to
 support the view that divorce and Gcentious-
 ness are in the relation of cause and effect.
 The speaker referred to the birth rate in
 pure New England families as very low, and
 without change the old New England blood
 would run out in 200 years. The foreign
 population altered the birth rate into respec-
 table figures, but the Puritan figures were
 small #- 7 1
 So it was with the pure New England
 blood that settled in the Ohio Reserve. The
 birth rate was nowadays very small. Figures
 were given comparing the frequency of di-
 vorces in this and European countries We
 were surpassed by but few countries-per-