The San Antonio light. (San Antonio, Tex.) 1883-1886, 1883-11-03
HE INCREASE OF DIVORCES
Indicates DissoIuteness of Manners and
Contempt for the sacredness of the
Marriage yows-what Rene
dw Ia Needed

unwilling to repeal the statute, making aband-
onment ground for divorce, would suggest
the wisdom and propriety Of allowing petit
tons for divorce for abandonment to
be filed only after the party has re-
period of FIVE consecutive years, and
where the abandonment has continued for a
like period. The applicant should also be re-
required to allege and prove that the aband-
onment took place without his or her fault,
consent, connivance or procurement, and also
that since said abandonment, he or she has
led chaste life.
The statute in regard to s,evetia, or cruelty
and outrages, might very properly be made
consonant with the ecclesiastical law on the
subject. In Sheffield VS.. Sheffield, 3 Tex, 70,
the court stated: "That the statutary provision
Of Texas covers more ground than is
embraced in the legal definition Of the term
cruelty, as the ill-trea,ment Of one party to-
wards the other m ay be Of such a nature as
without resort to personal violenee) to rem
der future cohabitation insupportable." So
modify the law as to make cruelty consist in
personal violence or a reasonable apprehen-
sion OF harm to life, limb OF health from per-
sonal violence and stop at that point. That
lessen the suits for divorce contamination
most devoutly to be wished" at least
by all good citizens. In the same case already
quoted from, Judge Hemphill says: "Mere
austeriiy of temper, petulance Of manners,
rudeness Of language, a want of civil atten-
tion-eyen occasional sallies of passion, il
they do not threaten bodily harm, do not
amount to legal cruelty against which the law
can relieve" Quoting Shelford on divorces
page $40, Evans VS.. Evans, Hagg. Rep,
50, a Kents Comm. I7s, Judge Hemphill
frankly admits that it is much more arduous
task, under the Texas statute, TO define what
act or acts, OF the effect of what acts, shall, in
law, be regarded as such i'll treatment as
would render the matrimonial union insup-
portable than it is to determine what consti-
tutes cruelty under the ecclesiastical law.
Sheffield VS.. Sheffield, 3 T., p.Ss.
1t would be gain, then, to place the Texas
statute in consonance with the ecclesiastical
law as to cruelty as a ground for divorce. In
myjudgment such change would not only
simplify the law but produce a diminution Of
divorces, withou, adding to the hardships Of
married persons whose tempers are uncon-
genial.
1t is obvious some steps must be taken to
prevent so much grist being brought to the
divorce mill, and to prevent marriages from
degenerating into concubinage at villa tenn
porary connection.
The churches, the public press, public
opinion and the tone Of society, separately
and conformity, can do vast deal towards
checking the mania for divorces, and all their
energies and influences should be at once
called into requisition. Ministers, by simply
refusing to solemnize the rites OF matrimony,
where one of the parties has been divorced
upon other than the ground of adultery, can
do much to arrest this growing evil; and il
they fully believe the scriptures to be rule Of
action for themselves, it is impossible to see
how they could act otherwise.
Early marriages SOW the seed for large
crop Of divorces. "Marry in haste, and re-
pent at leisure" is fruitful of divorces, where
they are to be procured easily; but this
cause lies beyond the reach of the law
and must be cured by education. Persons
who marry should understand that it is a seri.
Gus, solemn affair, destined to affect their wal
or woe for life, and for that reason they should
not "leap in the dark"-marry upon a short
lived acquaintance.
In my judgment, the laws vestipg in married
women their separate estate tends.to destroy
the oneness of interest as well as of feeling
which ought to exist between husband ant
wife, and 10 foment jars and troubles between
them. They disagree as to the proper man
agement of the wife's property, and these con
tentons eventually antagonize their interests
and feelings-perhaps eliminate in suit for Z
divorce. Having her separate estate dis
poses the wife to indulge in expenses
which her husband disapproves Of
and this produces a crop of jars anC
disagreements between them, reciprocally ir-
ritsting. Such friction between interest anc
interest, between temper and temper, is bu
too apt to end in alienation offeeling. These
married women hold a separate estate, to us'
the expressive but uncourty language o
Justice Wyndham, in the reign of Charles II.
"Wives are apt to be their own carvers, and
like hawks, will fly abroad and find thei
prey" In Rome, by law, the relation of TIL
wife to the husband was that of a child to
parent OF ward to guardian, and Terrence
whose plays furnish the happiest illustration
of Roman law, thus describes it: TIE Isl
virum do amicum, tutorem, patrem. Although
no resort to the courts was necessary, and tn
party wishing divorce had only to delive
the other party bill Of particulars, specifying
the grounds to secure divorce; no divorc
occurred for Goo years after the city Of Rom
was founded, which was no doubt due to tn