The Lincoln County leader. [volume] (White Oaks, Lincoln County, N.M.) 1882-189?, 1883-03-24
YOUR WIFE'S SISTER.

S"''' 'iih ~ EbilNt II MIL w SUI
pidIty. There is bill now, or act,
rather. on John Bulls statute book
which prohibits the marriage of a
manageable man to the sister of
his deceased wife, who il also mar
riagcable, and when both are anXi-
ous to assume the relations of hus-
band and wife. At the last session
Of the British Parliament an effort
was made to repeal the law, but the
attempt was abortive.
Much has been urged against
this innovation on English laws
and customs, both by speech and
publication, and a recent number
Of the ChWch Quarterly Rccie,c
contained an extract from the letter
of an American Clergyman gravclv
ccnsuring the alleged evils attend
ing the legality of such marriages
i'll this country. The reverend
gentleman, whose name by the way
is not given, makes some astonish-
ing, not saying startling, assertions
relative to domestic conditions atfcc-
ted by the Intervention of q sister.
He finds that there has grown up in
such families "a perceptible and
painful constraint-thc children
learning to look with apprehension
upon their mothers sisters, and
the wives becoming jealous Of their
influence with thcirhusbands. while
falniliarities which formerly were
thought to be, and really were, in
nocent have come to possess II CON
sciousness Of evil tendency Which
itself is the nature of sin. -
Was there ever such sickly SEN
timcntalism! y body of law-mak-
crs presume to formulate laws af-
fecting the welding Of hearts, the
cementing of atlectionate natures,
the destiny Of lives. Certainly
there is nat, and cannot be claimed
to be consanguinity existing be
tween man and the sister OF his
dead wife. There is no blood rcla-
tion unless there were such between
the aspiring widower and the dead
wife.
The clergyman who dips his oar
in is an intermcddler, who would
probably not decline fee offered
him to unite in marriage such as
he dcrides with his pen. The very
antipodes Of his theory is true
Surely it is more than supposablc
that during mans married life
the relations between the husband
and his wife's sister are closer than
those between a man and the sister
Of some other mans wife. There
is less dissemblance, hypocrisy and
false prescntmcnt existing between
them. The true character Of each
is known to each. Nature reveals
itself. Both are what they seem to
be profession wears the garb OF
known fact ; hence, when the wife
passes from out the house and lies
down meath the clods of the ccm-
ctery, what more natural than that
there should live in the hearts OF
the widowed man and family OF his
sainted wife, feelings either OF love
or enmity, according as those attri-
butes Of their natures were cult
waited before death dissolved the
civil relations which united them,
iucludingthc man and woman there
totore holding the relations Of bro
ther-in-law and sistcr-in-law. And
if love attracts the two latter, and
mellows into mutual desire of res
toring, re-cstablishing, and perpet-
uating the old yet tender family re
lationship, who upon the outside
should interpoSe objectionsi Only
two hearts, two dcstinies are in in
terest, and they ycaru for the CON
dition which the hcartless Lords
deny them. Ordinarily, marriage
is a lottery Neither man or wo-
man really know each other until