The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-08-03
TIE HUSBANDS POCKETS.
Reasons why the Wife Has a Right TO
Examine Them.

New York Sun.
The other day q magistrate of this town
gave TIE opinion. perhaps it is more acou-
rate 10 say the dictum, that a woman has
no right to "go through" her husbands
pockets. We don't know that there is any
light on the subject in the year books.
Most OF women's rights have grown UP
since then: and where did the tyrant man
Near his pockets in earlier days? Is there
anything in Froissart or anybody else
To show where Edward, the Black Prince,
in all his armor kept his change and how
he got at it? Where did Godfrey, of Bouil-
lon, hide his latchkey? 1t Is idle to tell
us of pouch and girdle. Robin Hood knew
where TO find the treasury Of the gentle
men whom he invited to contribute to the
support of a poor man whose leech had
forbidden him to eat anything but v~enison,
but did the sheriff of Nottingham have
anything that could properly be called a
trousers pocket? Did Bluebeard or Henry
VIII, in all his glory and his plethora of
matrimonial ventures, ever nave in hose
or doublet a pocket which could really be
described rs a change pocket. ''Ho. good
my almoner, fling ne a rose noble TO yon
merry minstrel" Q. we nave read his
tOrlcal novels and know their lovely Ian
guage, but we defy anybody 10 prove that
any law OF the easement of wives in the
pockets OF their husbands can be traced
until the origin and history Of the pocket
have been more fully explained.
Yet unless human nature was very back
ward, the women must lave exercised
from iTnmemorial times the privilege, since
grown into a right, of inspecting the
boards or caches OF their husbands. They
may not have looked for love letters, writ
Ing schools being then m and the
club or adze taking the place Of the COM
plete letter writer, but we may be sure that
they distracted acorns, thus laying uncon-
sc!ousiy but sOndly the foundation for the
beneficent principle Of an allowance. There
We're pockets in the earth or the tree or
lake; II IS no paradox TO say that pockets
came before clothes. And when the noble
salvage made him a coat Of the skin OF a
goat woman was there 10 share his tolls;
also MS receipts. We have no doubt that
Pocahontas, that Virginia nonpaTeil. went
through Master Rolfe's pockets as a%rtisti-
cal.y as If she had been bred within the
sound of Bow Bells.
BY prescription and age-long custom.
a married woman has obtained the right
TO search In her husbands pockets. Eco
nomically the custom is or has been justi-
fable. Woman has had to take her own
wherever she could find it. Morally the
custom Is Salutary. II shows a man the
fellow 10 a standard. warns him to be
careful in his correspondence, corrects
MS aNarice or his prOdlsalities. n woman
beSIhS, II we may hazard 4 theory. by
searching her boys pockets, sure to con-
tam many surprising and some noXiOus
objects. She has to become a censor and
inspector OF masculine treasures. TIN
IN the present day, when most men who
are not sailors or soldiers have lost the
art OF sewing, she is the pocket maker the
pocket p2tcher. She makes the pockets.
she keeps them in order. She has a clear
tltle 10 toll, rent, or whatever you want
10 call 1t; the wOman's penny. Without
her the SupeTciliOuS beast wouldn't have
any pockets. She is justified in charging
him a Zee, a slight interest on the enIow-
ment OF all his worldly goods. She has
the right TO garnish his pockets.
Besides. they are her pockets. Without
enlarglng upon the necessity of a common
household fund and of a special privy purse
Tor the wife, 1t is enough 70 say that since
Tor mysterious reason, into which heaven
lorfend that we should enter, she has nc
pockets Of her own. his must be hers
She has the right to use them. to collect
her just dues from them. If he doesn,,
like Il. let him stuff his ill-gotten gains
into saddlebags and carry them securely
0cked around with him or jingle his loos.
cnanSe INTO a safe deposit vault every day
But see what comes 10 the niggard. Ev-
cry day you read O. some churl who tucks
away money in "A mattress or an old stove
or a cracked coffe pot. Fate finds hin
out ana Furnishes him. Fire or the Junk.
man or the rag-nan gets the dollars he
grudged his wife. "
The right OF visitation of a husbands
POCKETS is important TO social Justice anc
domestic economy. 1t may b waived
but 1t Is only suspended, not lost.