The Fairmont West Virginian. (Fairmont, W. Va.) 1904-1914, 1914-02-12
JUDGE NAsON'S
ADDRESS IS
N0||:W||1TIME:lY
DIVORCE QUESTION WAS SUB.
JECT OF AN ABLE ADDRESS
BEFORE WOOD CO. BAR
ASSOCIATION. n

!eyytfS $500 Aaos pSS'Aa uS7UilA III iEu-
Guced IN congress to prevent there:
marrying of diyorcedspeoplei and the
craze for eugentc marriages has been
going on over the country, an address
delivered by Judge JOHN w. Mason
on this subject before the Wood
County Bar Association in May: 1912,
las become one of timely interest and
upon that occasion Judge Mason said
ia part:
IF divorces may be. granted simply
for the asking, or upon any flimsy
snbterfuge-because the parties want
TO qult-then marriage is an idle
inoekery, a cover for hypocrisy. Ii
would be only a legal protection, a
social excuse for what would other
wise be regarded as sin. We shall
therefore readily understand that
where an attempt is made through
the courts to undo a marriage-dis-
solve this status created by law-that
the state--society ~ becomes in q
sense, an interested party to thetpro.
ceeding, not necessarily to oppose it
but to make sure that the attempt
viii not prevail without sufficient
and lawful cause, shown by there
facts in the ease. Willie some one
representing society should examine
every suit for divorce end sec that the
decree is not obtained by fraud OF
eollusion, nor by neglect of either
l'arty to properly assert his rights,
may | not suggest that 1t is equally
important that more attention should
be given to the granting of licenses
10 marry and to solcmnizing mar.
liages? If 1T is the duty Of the state
TO interfere when there is an attempt
on the part Of u married person to
be relieved from the obligations Inn
l'nsed upon him by his marriage
VOWS, why not interfere before the
harm is done and more strictly regu-
late the granting of licenses and SOL
cmnizing marriages? Why should
the courts be continually untying
knots which should never have been
tied? am not unmindful of the diff.
f;cuities which legislation of this
Kind would encounter. Considering
that marriage is to II great extent a
natural right, that men and women
shonld be permitted to marry, and
that no unreasonable legal obstacle
should be tllrown in their way by the
law, but rather that proper marriages
should be encountered by the state,
yet this is not an absolute right.
Marriages are now, and always have
been restricted to some extent by
law, but rather that proper marriages
Should be encouraged by the state,
yst this is not an absolute right,
Marriages are now, and always have
teen restricted to some extent by
law. To place restriction. by a gen
eral law, upon men and women to
marry who are morally and physical
Is unfit to become heads OF families,
end at the same time, not embarrass
persons who ought to marry would,
! concede. require wise and difficult
legislation. But, should every man
and women who please to do so, and
who can raise enough money, to- pay
the county clerk and the preacher,
lave the absolute right to marry?
Shall the vicious and the criminal be
authorized by law to>reproducet their
own kind and inflict upon society a
family OF criminals-children cursed
with depraved blood? Men and wo-
men whose veins are filled with the
rolluted blood of thieves, or robbers,
and of murdercrs, and whose bodies
ure fostering with putrid sores re.