The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1897-05-28
MEN MAY SCREAM
But New Jersey Women Are
Going to Marry Them.
Convention Called to Consider
the New Law.
EITHER A HUGE JOKE
Or a Most Remarkable State of
Affairs
In the Thrifty Little Common
wealth Down East.

New I 4OIk, May ZS.-Ih6 marriage
Bile young women of New Jersey, and
there are lots of them-they point
themselves to the presence of $3.50
more women than men in the state
are lighting mad at the governor, the
legislature and anybody else connect
ed with the Lloyd marriage license bill
signed by Gov. Griggs, the confessed
object of which is to make it harder to
get married in New Jersey. The un-
married women object strenuously de-
cIar1nS there are none too many chan
ceS now to marry, and they don't want
to miss any of them. They will object
officially, too, for the amalgamated wo-
mems bachelors clubs of New Jersey
have called for a convention of all
marriageable young women in New
Jersey at Trenton the day the law is to
take effect.
The call for a state convention is
signed by Lavinia S. Morrills, Jersey
City, president; Hannah j. Ackers,
Paterson, vice president; Edna H. Earn
est Trenton, secretary; Melvina C.
Yates, Elizabeth, treasurer.
The clubs represented are: The Lady
Bachelors club of New Jersey; the
Bachelor Maids club, Trenton; the
Female Bachelors branch, Newark;
the MarriageabIe Ladies' society. Pat
ersOn; the Would-Be's club, Elizabeth;
the Home Makers club, Camden.
This formidable list will give some
idea of what men are up against in
New Jersey. Perhaps the legislature
thought they needed protection, and
especially men from other states who
meet Jersey women unawares.
The call refers with deep grief to the
statistical fact that Is per cent more
female children than male children are
born every year in the state, and con-
tinues by specifying with legal exact
ness provisions of the bill requiring
nonresident men proposing marriage
in the state to give five days notice be-
fore a license shall be granted, requir-
ing one of the parties to the match to
be identified by the county clerk, and
requiring afhdavits that no legal OBJ
stacle exists to the marriage. That is
what the girls don't like, and they ex-
plain why as follows:
Therefore, we declare that the five
day clause of said law Will prevent
spontaneous proposal and marriage and
will foster litigation in the form of
breach of promise suits in that it will
give the prospective groom five days
from the proposal in which to retract
thereby adding expense to the taxpay-
ers and further overburdening the poor
farmer to maintain the already expen-
siVe judiciary; and we therefore
Further declare that the said five
days clause will give opportunity for
other girls who may have rejected the
prospective groom on a mere summer
seaside proposal to prevent such mar
riage by circulating how she had re-
jected him; and we declare
Further, that such a thing as a pro-
posaI of marriage could not be kept
confidential for five days; and we de-
clare,
Further that the Identification clause
in line 7, Sec. l, is awful, because many
girls conduct their affairs by cores
pondence and could not identify him
and swear that he was all right; and
we declare,
Further, that the judiciary power
given in Sec. of the Lloyd marriage
law is terrible To think that a mere
clerk should be empowered to ask
prospective bride and a prospective
groom a whole lot of questions and
then decide whether they could be mar
ried or not; and we declare
Further that as we are informed the
county clerk doesn't keep his office open
at night, and as we know that men US
ually make proposal of marriage at
night the Lloyd marriage license law is
detrimental to our future prospects, an
abridgement of our rights as free wo-
men, and in violation of the United
States constitution, which guarantees
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi-
ness to all"
This declaration of independence un-
dOubtedly means business. The con-
ventiOn will make formal demand on
Governor GEiggs to abrogate the obnox-
iOuS features of the law so Jersey girls
can marry on a minutes notice.
The call by feminine necessity of
course concludes with a postscript. as
follows:
'P. S.-This letter is in the strictest
confidence. It must be carefully guard
ed SO that it won't get into the newspa-
perS.''