The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1884-11-12
The Rights Of Married Women.

Mr.. Editor II observe by your paper that
a bill to enlarge greatly the property rights
of married women has been proposed.
What IL is l am not informed and cannot
speak of details. But as a native of YER
mont take deep interest in the welfare of
the state and trust brief statement of the
effects of such legislation and the public
opinion which causes 1t, as they appear in
Massachusetts, may not be amiss We have
a class of professional reformers who, not
being responsible for the effect OF public
acts, are always ready when they see an
evil to assail the legislator, without regard
to the problems he must solve to secure
remedy. They can see but one side of the
shield. Unable to perceive that the rela-
tons between the sexes existing in marriage
were established on a compromise in which
each sex had the special advantages adapted
to its needs, woman having the right OF
maintenance, alimony, exemption from mill
tary service with further network of priv
ileges, while the man was accorded gem
eral headship in the family the right to its
earnings, suffrage etc, and, unable to real
ize that the stronger had any rights which
the weaker did not possess, they acclaimed
that his special privileges were tyrannous
usurpations. The converse, relative to hers,
did not occur to them. Hence they have
contended for forty years to secure for her
all the rights of man and all the privileges
of woman. Much may be said for the law
of forty years ago relating to their property.
If the woman had estate before marriage,
she could, if she wished, secure it substan-
TALLY from the husband by ante-nuptial con-
tracts or otherwise. As to what came after,
it must be remembered that the wealth.
producing power of woman compared with
that of man has been estimated to be about
in the proportion of eighteen to twenty-six
and of this the current rate of wages in the
same work Is evidence. Also that all neces-
sarily consume more than S1S out of each
S26 of their income wherefore as a rule all
the surplus wealth accruing after marriage
is derived from the earnings of the husband
and, from purely business point of view
belongs to him. and if he is held to support
her, she is held to reasonable service for
him. But, like all general rules, the old
system sometimes worked abuses. 1t was
unquestionably in its details proper sub
ject for improvement The public has been
piled with pictures of the drunken husband
the improvident man spending his wife's
portion, the miser denying her comforts
and the narrow-minded tyrant abusing her,
reiterations that his special privileges are
unjust usurpations, until, never seeing the
contemporaries, many people believe that
the general laws ought to be governed by
the exceptional cases. Massachusetts has
therefore come to be governed in these re-
lations on what may be termed the drunken
husband basis.
A few examples may be cited. Thus, If a
man be worth only tritle and his wife
worth million, yet every penny of his
shall be taken to support her according to
her style of life, while she is not held at
law to pay one for him,-nor even for her.
self. If he owns the homestead she has a
right to a home there-if she, he may be
turned out. IT, supported by him at home,
she chooses to work in the factory, abandon
ing the family, she may do so, pocket her
earnings, and compel him to hire such do
nestle service as he may need Nay, if he
be dry goods merchant she may set up
shop beside him and ruin his trade by the
ability which her right to claim her ex-
penses from his exchequer gives her to
undersell him. Inferior courts may, sub
ject to appeal, condemn him to the penal
servitude of supporting his wife and family
without their presence if she can persuade
them that she stays away justitiably, and it
was seriously urged that every trial justice
should have the power. He has only Il
qualified right in her presence, no right i'll
her property, none in her bed.
Largely permeating community as the
concomitant and cause of this condition is
the idea that any subOrdination of the will
of the wife to that of the husband is dis
graceful servility. More and more the idea
of the naturalization of woman prevails,
with separate rights, separate property, alb
soltlte independence, jealousy on her part
lest her rights in the common partnership
be invaded, and repugnance to domestic
labor. Separate careers are planned for the
girls, the shop, the factory-anything tC
avoid the drudgery where domestic service
of the wife is necessary. Among such peo-
pie the male element holds the same ideas
and has abdicated The Bible, with them
has no value except as curious literature
Is it true that the rights of men and
women are to be adjusted irrespective OF
their peculiar natures and functions in the
family and society as if they were all men
or all women? Have the flashlights of these
reformers dimmed the Pharos of st. Paul?
If they are indeed right, why do they
shrink from the logic Of their position and
demand for their clients all the rights Of
men and all the exemptions of women, in
stead of accepting the broad doctrine that
there should be no discrimination between
the rights, privileges or exemptions of the
sexes?
But the question of supreme interest is
what has been tbeeffect of this great change
in the relations of the sexes; this essenta
reversal of popular ideas; this new de
parture in the conduct of the family and o
life? What is the consequence of this indi
valuation of woman upon society? III We
read correctly the record of Massachusetts
nothing less than the total humiliation o
the race that adopts it. The movement be-
gan about 1870 The first woman suffrage
convention was in 1874. The first minol
change in the laws apparently caused by tn,
new theories was in 1915, no material modi
fcation appearing till 1855. Now in Massa
chuSettS the new doctrine has neVe
materially affected the foreign born Theil
European training has tended to keep then
from its flood, but the rock of their preserva
ton has been the Catholic church. tt
trace the social effects, therefore, we SHOULD
compare the native born of the present witt
the native of the period of 1S40-and, sid,
by side in the same community, the nativ,
with the foreigner. Prior to about 1850 tn,
registration statistics, begun in 1912, hav,
little value for certain reasons that need no
be detailed. We are forced to begin later
The first important fact is that 23.4 person,
per thousand per annum were married il
the five years ending in 1855 but only II.
during the past ten years-that is to say
the marriage rate was over forty-two pc
cent greater in the earlier period than now
Shortly prior to 1855, great body of foreign
born people settled in Massachusetts, il
number about equaling the total increas
since. The young came, hence their mar
riage rate was high, and children of foreigl
stock multiplied rapidly in the next tel
years. These children, classed as native il
our tables, are of the foreign element, a
contradistinguished from the Puritan stock
in their relations to the present question
They are just now of manageable age am
swell the apparent native marriage rate
The effect Of the reform ideas will gradual
cease to appear in the tables unless the ne,
stock adopt them. Great material pros
perity also increases the marriage rate
Thus the rate was higher in '7l-2-3 an
1923. The period 1S76-S0 was of averag
prosperity and freer from the effect of tn
quasi foreign native stock. During tha
period only 14W persons in each thousan
of the American stock were married. BIZ
the marriage rate of the native born in Is,