Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1910-05-21
THE DIVORCE PROBLEM
AS A HOME NRECKER.
Marriage Should Be More
Than Business Contract.


with the exception of Hunoarr,
America is the read est of all nations
TO iounl homes on the marriage tie
but America is also the readiest r.
wreck those homes by divorce. The
average number of marriages for the
Whole country is 356 out Of 100000
OF the population. Hungary. which
heads the world, has ass in everv
100000, bu- in America there are "a
divorces for every 100000 in the POM
lat on annually.
AS to the causes given for divorce.
in a recent government report. we
ind desertion heads the list, and that
women are more liable to become de-
serters than men, Cruelty is the
second predominating cause, and the
increase of cruelty On the part of
wives to husbands shows that the fe-
male Drawn is being well developed in
America The third cause is infidel-
ity' and drunkenness is given as the
fourth cause, while neglecs to provide
Is the fifth These five causes covered
81 per cent. of the DEGREES issued.
Though more than 100000 divorces
have been granted in the United States
in 20 years, against 100000 in Europe
during the same tine, with 100000 900
population, against our 9O,OO0,OOO. it
does not follow from a domestic view
point that we are below the moral
standard of Europe.
The best men in the world are in
America, and nowhere in the world
are women enthroned as in America
Our advancing civilization has en-
larged women's ideas, and, with a
better conception of her nature and
rights, she would rather make her
own way in the world than live lie
with man for the sake of suppors
l believe that divorce is justifabie
on more grounds than one, and that
making hell Of the hottest human re-
lation is worse than divorce. l know
that domestic bliss Of the purest kind
las spme to many people through the
bitter medicine labeled divorce"
When marriage may lightly be set
aside, when a man can have wife af,
ter wife, and woman husband after
husband, getting rid of each other in
turn, we shall reach the condition of
the old-time Mormon, with this sole
difference-that his polygamy was
while ours is conseca-
tive. The original Mormon could
AVE as many wives as he could main
tain, or as many as he might have
needed to mainta II lin, while the
5killful divorcer of today can have as
many, only not all at once, but one
after another, as he can decently or
ndecently acquire. If we keep going
on at our present rate-one divorce
to every ten marriages viii |
soon be no more husbands and wives.
out poor creatures taken by some form
Of law and then dropped by some
other form, bound only by her or his
pleasures. 1t is plain to be seen that
he women, as usual, would be the
worst sufferers, and, degraded and
would cease to be wives;
out simply reg. stored concubines.
Marriage is more than a business
or a social partnership,
4 firm which the partners are free
o dissolve at their pleasure or con-
7enience. The old idea of the sacred
character of marriage has, unfortu-
lately, vanished, and there is the sign
If an infidel society, the heresy born |
and bred of free thought as applied
o religion, and Professionalism is in
need of toning up on this subject
However distasteful ecclesiastical au-
hority may be to the average Ameri-
IAN. the fact remains that the more
Protestants the more divorces, and al
.hough a Presbyterian minister, the
writer confesses that our easy divorce
S a dark stigma which all earnest
Christian Protestants should do their
Utmost to efface.