The record-union., 1899-12-24
THE OAKLAND CASE AGAIN.

1
that a husband may habitually remain
out late of nights. and that he is not
required to account to his wife for his
whereabouts. 1t sees in the decision
a trend that is vicious, and holding,
that If law, Is very bad law. 1t calls
up the possible case of a wife doing as
the court has declared husband my do
with impunity, and asks what would
be the consequences? May the wife
keep all sorts of hours, go off on
drunken sprees and not be held ac-
countable?
| Since the subject is being treated so
seriously and as the Record Union
| remarked upon 1t hunaorously, it is in
order for it now to say that the case
is much misunderstood. The court was
| trying a cause in which extreme cruelty
was charged. 1t holds that no extreme
cruelty was proved; that there was
moral delinquency, bad habit and vul-
gar action in abandoning the wife night
after night. and in refusing to give her
good reason for the absence from home
at hours when most honest men are at
rest.
| Clearly the court was right in refus-
ing to dissolve the matrimonial bond
for the reasons advanced; it was not
extreme cruelty. To hold that it was,
would be to open a door for dissolution
of the marriage tie that would make
mockery of matrimony, and render
marriage farcical II the husband be-
haved as the wife complained, he was
unfeeling, brutal, trampled upon her
affections, treated her with contempt
and as no decent man will treat a
woman. But she has taken the man
under the law in a contract that can
be dissolved for specific reasons only,
among which extreme cruelty is speci-
fed and she must stand to the con-
tract.
We do not understand the court to
have held, as our esteemed contempt
right to stay away from his home at
night habituaily, "associating with dis
solute women" and carousing, and that
the wife has no remedy. Association
with dissolute women would give her
cause in most cases, and the courts
have SO repeatedly held. But even
that is a dangerous door to open, and
hence courts jealously guard it. and
|
lation of the marriage obligation be-
fore they make DEGREES capable of be-
ing used as presidents to promote di-
vorce and bring marriage into con-
| tempt.
The suggestion that no court would
justify married woman in remain
ing out late at night, going to late
| suppers with strange men, carousing
and drinking, etc, is, of course, sound
But the cases are not parallel. There
is by the decree of society a distinct
line drawn between improperly in men
and immodesty in women. However
we may philosophize about the rights
of members Of the marriage being
equal, they are not, and they should
not be. The husband may remain out
late and refuse to account for his alb
sence to his wife, and no offense under
the law be committed against her, but
neither society nor the law will permit
a woman to smirch her character an6
blacken the name Of her husband anG
her children by like conduct, or by
habit on her part, as the Mercury
suggests, parallel to that Of the hus.
band in the Oakland case.
Woman, because of her sex, her nat
lural weakness, her position in the home
is certainly justly and in her own in.
terest held to an accountability tt
i which the man is not called. If the
editor of the Mercury" is seen at
in the morning upon the streets Of
San Jose, or even bracing up a bal
for hotseotch these frosty low hours
Of morning, the fact will not blast his
character, ruin his reputation or dis
grace him to all eternity. But sup.
pose the editors wife is found upor
the highway at such an hour alone, OF
in house of refreshment 'bracing up
also. what then? The suggestion covers
the whole field of the debate
dolls were made in this country ani