Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1911-09-20
The American "Leprosy.n

The trial of young man in Vir-
ginia, charged with killing his wife,
has filed the papers with much
that is unsavory; and many think
that the publication of such testi-
mony has an injurious effect upon
public morals. There is much that
could be said along this line, but
we should remember that such trials
simply uncover, they do not
produce, social conditions. They
turn on the light and light is heath
full. There are certain social evils,
which are occupying the very
sources of life, but which never
come to the surface even for mo-
ment, except in such revelations as
that which has come in this Vir-
ginia trial. But whether good or
evil comes of these revelations de-
pends, at last, wholly upon the
moral judgments the community
pronounces upon them.
There was one feature in the tes-
timony of the unfortunate young
wife, which, we think, the public
cannot afford to let pass unnoticed.
1t points to an evil about which too
little is said; and about which too
little is known by the public. This
silence and ignorance would be ex-
cusable if the evil lurked only in
vile districts in the city and did not
endanger the purest of the most
innocent homes. And the igno-
rance and silence could be the bet
ter justified if only a few homes
were endangered. But such is not
the case. The dispatches which
gave the account of the testimony
of the heart-broken mother simply
say: Prosecutor Wendenberg ques-
toned the woman as to her knowl-
edge of the domestic life of the
Beatties and brought to the sus-
face point intended as relevant to
the alleged motive of the murder,
namely, that Beattie's physical con-
dition, due to dissipation, had
caused much unhappiness to his
wife,"
In these yelled words reference is
made to disease and an evil the
extent of which, if we are to be-
lieve the testimony of the whole
medical profession, is certainly ap-
palling. In conversation with ply
sicians recently we were amazed be-
yond all measure to be told that by
the very lowest estimate eighty-fve
per cent of the me n folk of this
country are or have been contami-
mated: and some physicians think
that ninety-fve per cent. is nearer
the truth. If the effects of these
horrible diseases were confined
wholly to the guilty they would be
even then too awful to contemplate;
but we are dealing with an evil that
can be transmitted in its loathe-
someness to mans innocent off
spring. Who can think of such a
thing without shudder? But by
far the most astonishing thing we
learned in our conversation with the
physicians-it is almost unbelieva-
ble-1s that the profession estimates
that about eighty-fve per cent. of
the surgical operations on the inno-
cent wives of America has been
caused by this unnamable evil!
And what is being done to pro-
tect society and the home, and the
home that is to be, the young bride
and the unborn children? The an
swer is, nothing, absolutely nothing
in many states. What can be done?
Much in every way. Above all,
the obstruction of the double stand
ard. But also the state should re-
fuse to issue a marriage license to a
man who is less entitled to it than a
rotting leper.-Baptist Courier.