The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1895-03-29

them out or correct them is by easy
divorce" Well, before you yield q
that cry, let us find out how easy it IL
now.
have looked over the laws of al
the states, and / find that while iL
some states it is easier than in others
in every state it is easy. The state o1
Illinois, through its legislature, recites
a long list of proper causes for divorce
and then closes up by giving to the
courts the right to make d decree o1
divorce in any case where they deem
it expedient. After that you are not
surprised at the announcement that in
one county of the state of Illinois, in
one year, there were eight hundred and
thirty-three divorces. If you want tc
know how easy it is, you have only tc
look over the records of the three hun.
1red and thirty-three divorces in one
year; and in twenty years in New En-
gland twenty thousand. Is that not
easy enough?
If the same ratio continue-the ratio
of multiplied divorce and multiplied
causes of divorce-we are not far from
the time when our courts will have to
set apart whole days for application,
and all you will have to prove against
man will be that he left his news
paper in the middle of the floor, and
all you will have to prove against a
woman will be that her husbands over
coat is buttonless. Causes of divorce
double in a few years-doubled in
France, doubled in England, and doub-
/ Iod ~ tho TTnSta1 Cfofoc No show
how very easy it is, / have to tell you
that in the Western Reserve, o., the
proportion of divorces TO marriages
celebrated is one to eleven; in Rhode
Island is one to thirteen; in Vermont
one to fourteen. Is not that easy
enough?
want you to notice that frequency
of divorce always goes along with the
dissoluteness of society. Rome for
FIVE hundred years had not one case of
divorce. Those were her days of glory
and virtue. Then the reign of vice
began, and divorce became epidemic.
If you want to know how rapidly the
empire went down ask Gibbon.
What we want in this country and in
all lands is that divorce be made more
and more and more difficult. Then
people before they enter the marriage
relation will be persuaded that there
will probably be no escape from it ex-
cept through the door of the sepulcher.
Then they will pause on the verge of
that relation until they are fully salts
fed that it is best, and that it is right,
and that it is happiest. Then we shall
have no more marriage in fun. Then
men and women will not enter the re-
lation with the idea it is only trial
trip, and if they do not like it they
can get out at the first landing. Then
this whole question t4ill be taken out
of the frivolous into the tremendous,
and there will be no more joking about
the blossoms in L~ide's hair than
about the cypress on Il coffin.
What we want is that the congress
of the United States change the ma
tional constitution so that law can
be passed which shall be uniform all
over the country, and what shall be
right in one state shall be right in all
the states, and what is wrong in one
state will be wrong in all the states.
How is it now? If party in the mar
riage relation gets dissatisfied. it is
only necessary to move 10 another
state to achieve liberation from the
domestic tie, and divorce is effected
SO easy that the first one party knows
of it is by seeing it in the newspaper
that Rev. DR.. Somebody, on March II,
1895, introduced in a new marriage re-
lation member of the household, who
went off on a pleasure excursion to
Newport or a business excursion to Chi
cago. Married at the brides house.
No cards. There are states of the
Union which practically put pre-
MUM upon the disintegration of the
marriage relation, while there are
other states, like our own New York
that had for a long time the pre-emi-
nent idiocy of making marriage lawful
at twelve and fourteen years of age.
The congress of the United States
needs to move for change of the ma
tional constitution, and then to APP
point committeeman made up of
single gentlemen, but of men of fami-
lies, and their families in Washington
who shall prepare a good, honest,
righteous, comprehensive, uniform law
that will control everything from
Sandy Hook to the Golden Horn. That
will put an end to brokerages in mar
riages. That will send divorce law
yers into decent business. That will
set people agitated for many years on
the question of how shall they get
away from each other to planning how
they can adjust themselves to the more
or less unfavorable circumstances.
More difficult divorce will put an
estoppel to a great extent upon mar
riage as financial speculation. There
are men who go into the relation just
as they go into Wall street to purchase
shares. The female to be invited into
the partnership of wedlock is utterly
unattractive, and in disposition sup
pressed Vesuvius. Everybody knows
it, but this masculine candidate
for matrimonial orders through
the commercial agency or through
the county records, finds out how
much estate is to be inherited, and
he calculates it. He thinks out how
long it will be before the old man will
die, and whether he can stand the re-
fractory temper until he does die, and
then he enters the relation; for he says:
'If I can not not stand it, then through
the divorce law I'll back out" That
process is going on all the time, and
men enter the relation without any
moral principle, without any affection,
and it is as much a matter of stock
speculation as anything that transpired
yesterday in Union Pacific, Illinois Cen
tral or Delaware & Lackawanna.
Now, suppose man understood, as
he ought to understand, that if he