Connecticut western news., 1882-06-28
WORKINGMHN'S WIVES.
Hints that May be Read With Ad- vantage.
From the New York Sun

We have recelV ca the 1OllOW1ng con- i munication from 8 Jersey City corre- spondent, who has been stirred some by | remarks of ours to a young woman whose hand had been sought in mar riage by printer:
 'It will be lucky for the printer if he gives your correspondent Sincerity a wide berth. Matrimony is simply 8 business partnership. No man under salary should marry poor woman. She should have money and be capable of earning as much as her husband. The idea of supporting a lazy woman is played out. In fact, man is fool to put such millstone around his neck. I have been frequently called upon to congratulate some of my working breth- ren on their marriage to poor girls. I have done so, however, with as heavy a heart as if they were going up the river for twenty years. What is the difference NIxY."
 There is good deal of difference. A man goes to prison because he has vio- lated law, and IS dangerous person to be at large. A man who marries obeys the law of God, of nature, and of his own being. The cynicism of our cor respondent is silly, and his lack of sen- timent is discreditable to him. How ever, he is not likely to make many converts to his ugly views, and it is therefore entirely safe to give his letter prominence here.
 Matrimony is not business partner ship, and bears no likeness to one. It is, however, 8 union of interests as we'll as affections, and concerns not merely the two who are welded, but their pos terity, and society in general. The unit | of society is the family, and it is for the common good, therefore, that marriage should be encouraged, and right views concerning it's responsibilities d1ssemi- mated. If men and women could wed each other for limited period only, and so form copartnership like those entered into for mere business pur- poses, the institution of the family would be uprooted, society would have no stability, there would be no security for the rearing of children, and practi- cal free love would result. Something more than material interest must govern the action of married people. They must be welded together by sentiment, and kept united by common love of their children and common pride in the preservation of their families. Those are not business considerations, in which such sentiments have no part.
 "No man under salary should marry apoor woman," says our correspondent. Whom, then, is he to marry? Who shall marry the poor woman or shall they go unmarried ? The woman who is not poor may not be willing to marry the poor man, and rich men may not want the poor women. Indeed, as so- oiety grows older the tendency of wealth is to seek wealth or gravitate to- ward wealth in marriage. It is in the nature of things that it should try to strengthen it's position. Besides, the social intercourse of the rich is such as to bring the rich in contact with the rich, and they are most likely to marry among their own sort. It must be re- membered, too, that the supply of girls with money is not large enough to go around. It does not suffice to satisfy the demand among young men of ex- travagant habits, and therefore the pro- DOT tion of marriages among them is smaller than in any other class.
 It is doubtless true, however, that a poor man cannot afford to marry a woman to be maintained simply as an ornament. He needs helpmeet. fel- low worker. To get such woman he is wisest in the run of cases, if he weds one who, like himself, has been accus- toned to the economies and is able to fulfill the duties imposed by narrow means. If he is workingman, he wants working wife, one who can take care of his home, and, if necessary and possible, contribute to the common fund for the support of the family. He is to work in one way and she in another, and they are to hold their earnings jolntly. Both the man and the wornan should expect to do that, and be proud to do it. So doing, they will both gain by marriage not merely sentimental benefits, but substantial ones also. French women, for instance, who can perform skilled labor, will often hire their rough do- mestic work done in order that they , may have time for other employment at which they can make much more than the wages of the domestic. It is wise custom.
 The right kind of working girl makes a better wife for workingman than a rich girl would. She is better adapted to him. The great majority of the rich and well-to- do men in New York started out in life with wives poor like them selves. They pulled together and made common sacrifices, the wife contributing as much to the success achieved as the husband. It was, indeed, because they had such wives that they won success. Two are better than one, especially where both are good. The workingman who IS married to good wife, devoted to his interests and ready to share his tolls as we'll as his joys, who is strength ened by carrying the responsibilities oi tho family, gets along in the vast majority of cases better than his old bachelor comrades. He is a better human being, at any rate. Such mer do not follow the ideas of our cor
 respondent. They marry girls of thei1