The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1892-11-02
Penalty for Marrying in Evasion
OF Vermont Statute.

Editor Wdtchmon:-The introduction Of
bill declaring void marriages made in eva
sion of Vermont law is the occasion of a
very unmannerly newspaper attack upon
the Chelsea representative. Though so
heavily loaded with malice as to fall harm
less to the person aimed at this shaft of
ugly criticism contains many misstatements
as to the bill which ought to be corrected
BY our existing divorce statute, enacted in
1873 for the purpose OF diminishing divorces
1t is provided that the party from whom
divorce has been obtained shall not marry
another than the petitioner within three
years, unless the petitioner dies within that
time, and punishment of from one to five
years imprisonment in state prison is pro-
vided for one violating that statute or liv-
ing in the state under a marriage relation
forbidden by it. Now, if these statutes
mean anything, they ought to be enforced
and the respondent in a state prosecution
should not be given loop-holes of escape
But it is well understood by bench and bar
alike that, without some statute directing
comfy will hold marriages solemnized in
another Christian state or county according
to their laws to be good, though obtained
by persons domiciled in this state who have
gone into that other state or county solely
to evade our laws prohi biting such mar
riages. Hence, though our statute says
that the petitionee in a divorce proceeding
shall not marry another than the petitioner
within three years after divorce obtained
and provides punishment for it, that pun
ishment cannot be enforced against such
petitionee who marries again in some other
state no matter how soon. All that defend
ants in divorce proceedings have to do is to
slip over into New York New Hampshire
Massachusetts or Canada and be married
when and to whom they please Moreover
it is even maintained by good lawyers that
should they at once return to Vermont and
live here in the marital relation, they can
not be made amenable to the penalty which
section 1892 of Revised Laws prescribes
Nor is the lawyers reasoning in this re-
spect by any means mere sophistry. II
might quite possibly persuade our courts
that 1t Is no crime for persons whose mar
raiage is perfectly lawful to live in the mar
riage relation.
House bill No. 81, introduced by Mr.. Oar
ling, seeks to remedy this manifest defect
in our divorce law. No revolutionary
legislation - is proposed, but only prepa-
ration for the enforcement of what law we
already have. 1t applies only to residents
of this state, and is meant to keep them
from defying and deriding the law of YER
mont. 1t is intended only for those who,
with guilty purpose TO evade our laws,
have deliberately set them at defiance.
Section one of the bill provides: When
ever any man and any woman residing in
this state shall, in order to evade the pro-
visions of law in this state prohibiting their
I
ing to reside in this state, go into another
state, such marriage shall be deemed void"
What legal objection can be made to such
a law? Not, certainly, that the legislature
has no right to enact 1t. Mr.. Bishop, one
of our best authorities on criminal law, ad-
mits such a right, and in his latest work
this eminent writer says; Any one Of our
states may validly ordain by express terms
in statute that the marriages of its citi-
zens outside of its territory shall be void if
in noncompliance with rules which itself
prescribes. In Massachusetts has existed
for nearly sixty years a statute almost iden-
teal with the one above proposed. True,
this bill provides punishment for persons
marrying in another state contrary to oar
laws, but only when they are again resi-
dents of this state and went out with the
intention of evading our laws. ''Suppos-
ing they marry and reside there" nobody
proposes or supposes that Vermont law
can be made TO punish the citizen of any
other state, within the jurisdiction of that
state" Ought representative to be abused
for doing his plain duty in calling the legis-
lators to a defect in the statute and propos-
ing remedy both wise and timely?
CITIZEN.