The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1889-12-04
WEDNESDAY, December 4, 1888.
MARRIAGE LICENSES.

MARRIAGE LICENSES.
On last Friday tbs lower branch OF
the Legislature passed to its third
reading marriage license bill, and
the indications are that it will become
a law. We can see no reason for Its
passage and hope the senate will frus-
trate this attempt at the destruction
OF the safe guards now thrown around
our women who enter the conlugal
relation. The marriage laws Of South
Carolina as they now stand are wise
and worthy Of imitation, but let this
ehsnge be made and we open the
food gate 10 ridicule, chaos, and con-
fusion. We had not the time we
should Like to have had to consider
the bill before discussing it, but even
at q glance objections thick, and
clear as bubbles gurgling up from an
adder meath crystal waters, arise to
its condemnation.
We fancy q girl who has agreed to
marry q man of comparatively short
acquaintance. He has every appear
ance Of being a gentleman. and has
procured the license from the proper
officer. The ceremony is performed
but after awhile, to her sorrow, she
learns that be left q wife behind, in
another State perhaps. Her friends,
naturally, ask why she did not inves-
eigate and ascertain who and what ne
vas and where he came from. Her
answer might be, "He was licensed
by my State to marry me, and why
should I question that which was GU
shorized by chivalrous South Carroll
NAP" That the State would grant 8
married man the license to marry her
was too preposterous to contemplate,
and death blow surely that she
dreamed not OF. Could she not have
conscientiously inferred that the clerk
OF court made the necessary inquiries
beSore issuing the license? and yet,
the bill imposes no such duty upon
him. Her unhappy condition IS
caused by her State more than her.
Sell.
We fancy another who, also, is en-
gagged to be married. This time,
however, to a man in every way eapa-
BILE Of making her kind and loving
husband and laboring under no disa-
biiities. Papa objects; off they
ay away. On TO market they 60 to
buy their license but are informed
shat the old man distsnced them by
another route, employed lawyer,
and in some mysterious way intercept
ed the issuance of it. What then?
stony limits cannot keep love out!"
OF again they go; but where? He,
perhaps, to his death; she, to her
doom; for without the license there
can be no marriage.
There are hundreds Of ways by
which the license viii be defeated to
the woman's injury, to say nothing OF
forgeries, and in that event no matter
how intimate the relations are, there
viii be no legal ties TO bind the par
ties.
Under the law as it now stands
ssousia would
ike 10 prove himself not MSfried but
in fact is. Under the new law there
win be many q woman who would be-
heve herself married, but is not.
Marriage is, With us, but a
question Of intention Once
she agreement TO be man and
wife is entered into between parties
able and wiling to 50 contract, the re-
iasion is established; whether it be
made in public or in private. The
ceremony; the change of the wife's
aame: the subsequent cohabitation
etc; are but evidences Of the agree
msns and gre not essential 10 the
validity OF ths marriage.
From another standpoint also, we
enssrsain grave doubts Of the feasibil-
isyso' such legislation. In one of our
leading eases on marriage decided by
the. court of Appeals when South Car
olina's brightest luminaries OF the law
adorned The bench, Chancellor John
son, ve think it was, in delivering the
opinion of the court said: Marriage
is An institution created by God him
ssli, and founded in the law Of nature.
Is is she parent not the child, OF civil
society" II then this institution is
the parent OF civil society," founded
in nature, and created by God, why
shenld tee Legislature-a branch Of
tie civil government-conpel the
citizen 10 pay a license fee to do that
which it has not the power Of prohib-
iting entirely? Take man so eircum-
saneed that he cannot get to the
county seat, too poor to pay for the
license osdsRposed by some insur-
monntee OBSTACLE; he may be mar
red with the most solemn rites and
ceremonies, yet this bill makes the
woman his concubine and his children
spurious God forbid that such a,
law shall ever tarnish the fair fame of
South Carolina!
Isis not eontended by the advocates
of the bill that the Legislature can
altogether prevent marriage among
the people, yet it does undertake to
prohibit the creation of that relation
amongst those w ho cannot, Or do not,
take out the license. An anomaly,
to say the least ofit.
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