The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-12-13
MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE.

last IN 10rty-nlne minutes granted four
| divorces, all on the ground of desertion.
| This fact will be made text for fresh
| denunciation of the liberal divorce" laws
| of Washington and Oregon by the ''di-
vorce reform" agitators at the East
/ Nevertheless the Protestant doctrine as to
divorce permits the dissolution of mar
rage on either of the two grounds of
| adultery or wilful desertion the one the
cause allowed by Jesus. according to Pro-
testant Interpretation of Scripture, and
the other the cause allowed by st. Paul
under the explanation of his words by the
| evangelists of the Reformation.
The Roman Catholic law of marriage
| forbids divorce for any cause whatever
and makes marriage sacramental and
dissoluble only by death, but Protestant
ism as early as 1541 declared that wife
was no longer bound to husband who
had abandoned her. and the Westminster
| Confession prescribes that nothing but
adultery, or such wilfuI desertion as can
no way be remedied by the church or civil
magistrate, is cause sufficient for dissolv-
/ ing the bond of marriage" The theory of
the divorce laws of nearly all our states is
consistent with the Protestant doctrine.
which, as defined by Judge Sibley, of the
Methodist church, holds that adultery,
desertion and other acts which, like the
first, destroy the sexual purity of the rela-
ton, or. like the second, operate to deny
to an innocent party or to society the sub
stantial benefits, and so what is essential
in the right of the relation, if its bond be
held indissoIuble, are valid causes for an
nulling it.
Whatever tends to defeat the purpose of
the marriage relation is Just and reason
able ground for it's dissolution, and the
courts are in line with the Protestant
church when besides adultery they hold
desertion, failure to support, habitual
drunkenness and cruel treatment legal
| grounds for divorce. In the rural districts
Of New England it is not difficult to get a
| divorce on the plea of "Intolerable sever
| ity," term so literally construed by the
court that there need be no proof of any
severity" more intolerable than long
and vigorously maintained purpose to
plague and hate each other until death
shall part-death that divorces both snarl-
ing enemies and signing lovers with equal
hand.
The clerical view of the situation is that
the enlarged laws and hberalized courts
stand for very Satan squatting at the
ear of every malcontent Eve in the land,
tempting her to disobedience and do
mestic diabolism to provoke a retaliation
that can be construed as 'intolerable Sc
verify" Judicial philosophy holds that it
| is social follyNand cruelty to let the mental
and moral corrosion and erosion of dis
cordant couples proceed to its inevitable
immoral conclusion, and therefore the
court cuts the knot that never ought to
have been tied.
The evil, the real evil that courts did not
create and courts are powerless to destroy,
except so far as stringent marriage laws
can do it, is the low view of marriage
taught by vast number of parents, who
are not ordinarily wicked persons, unless
it be wicked not to be wise. The average
woman is taught that marriage is the high
est goal Of her existence; that an unmar-
| ried woman is a sort of social torso, as I'M
canny and as unwelcome a figure as a
hunchback or a clubfoot; that the greatest
possible calamity that can befall woman
is to so unmarried, while really the great
est possible calamity that can befall her is
to marry an aggressively bad or passively
! worthless man. To these corrupt mar
riages of business, convenience and ca
price add the mooncalf marriages of bows
and girls, that is. marriages of puppy sem
timent and mere propinquity, as distin-
guished from the manly affection of ma
turity. and no wonder the door of the di-
yorce court is crowded with wretches wait
ing for relief.
To these causes of trouble should be
added the folly of persons of either sex
entering the marriage state who are physi-
cally untitled by hopelessly intirm consti-
tuition or imperfect bodily organization
and development, to assume the grave re-
sponsibiiity of maternity or paternity.
Gross inequality of bodily health be-
tween the sexes cannot give other than
ample promise of an inteicitous union,
and among the candidates for legal sepa-
ration are doubtless many of those who,
defying physiology, married only to find
themselves mismated, and ask the lawyer
to undo what no good physician would
ever have advised.
Viewed on all sides, the social picture of
marriage as it is written in the records of
divorce suits and discordant unions is
both unpleasant and perplexing. 1t
will not look any better until
woman's work and wages are
enlarged to a point of more universal
capacity for decent and comfortable self
support so that n girl will not be tenn pied
by toll and privation, by a keen sense of
industrial helplessness 10 marry a dog be-
cause she needs his kennel; until parents
teach their children from the dawn of
their years of observation and understand
ing early and late that wealth with
out purity is poverty in marriage; that
poverty, with purity and fidelity, is wealth.
because it means that true companion
ship which makes the grave the sublim-
ated essence of cruelty, was il not that the
rational thought of heaven implies the re-
union OF all loves, and only those loves,
that were both tender and true.
Law cannot in social justice and sound
public policy refuse liberal divorce; nor
can legal restraints and severe penalties
do much 20 prevent bad marriages whose
volcanic forces explode in divorce; the re-
hgious influences, higher education, in