Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-05-15
EXPERIMENTAL
MATRIMONY
By Frederic J. HaSkin
r EW YORK, May 10.-The news
that Fannie Hurst, authoress
of many stories depicting the

puts family life in the discard has
excited widespread interest; but not
nearly as much comment as such an
experiment would have caused few
years ago. For hers is not really
an isolated case. Every once in a
while some new form of marriage,
designed by the parties thereto in
accordance with their own ideas, is
recounted in the newspapers, and
| there are many such ventures which
do not get into print at all.
At the same time wave of reform
in marriage laws is sweeping across
the world. England has passed a
law making divorce much easier, and
enc is being considered in Denmark.
| Even our own senate, which is about
as we'll protected from the winds of
change as any legislative body in
the world. has held hearings on a
| proposed measure to make the d.
vorce laws of the United States uni
form. The senate refuses to make
public it's hearings, and there is no
| indication that it will act upon the
| information obtained, but the fac
that the senate thought about it at
all is highly significant.
Alarming Changes
All Of this is very disturbing to
us of the older and more piouS gen.
Grafton, who have long regarded mat
1imony as a sacred institution, if not
an absolutely indissoluble union. But
the facts, however unpalatable, must
| be faced and recounted. There is a
worldwide revolt against the beau
| tiful and uplifting conception of mar
| riage which has served so many gen.
erations so well. The strength cf
| this revolt is shown by the fact
that it can make itself felt in such
| bodies as the British parliament and
| the congress of the United States.
stage and the literature Chose mir
rors of the social mind) of a genera
| ton ago with those of today in order
to realize that the attitude of the
public consciousness on the subject
| has changed. Twenty or thirty years
! back marriage was always treated on
! the stage reVerently and seriously
| Now any vaudeville artist can get
| a laugh by some sort of wheeze di-
rected against the monotonies, alb
| Surdities or the restrictions Of mar
ried life. Likewise before 1890 near
| 1y all novels began with a love af-
fair and ended with wedding bells,
the assumption being that all the
troubles of the characters ended
Herewith. But nowadays a realistic
| novel begins with marriage and fol-
lows through to divorce, or to some
other sort of wreck for that insti
tuition. Even the cartoons in news
papers of conservative and estimable
| type make fun Of marriage and get
by with it.
Meantime some persons like Miss
Hurst, who are not content to wait
for changes in law and custom, pro-
coed to cut the marriage garment
to suit themselves. There is what
| might be described as colony OF
young married women in New York
who do not take the names Of their
husbands, but keep their own. One
of them is said to be engaged in
and expedtency of this. Almost in
variably these women work. and in
many cases they are wholly self-sup-
| PORTING. They enjoy a good deal
! more freedom, and a good deal more
contact, with the. world. than the
married woman of more conservative
| type who is content to find her place
in the home. Their point of view
was well voiced by Miss Hurst when
she said that she did not propose to
state of "sedentary fatheadedness."
A Challenge to Marriage
This is in effect a taunt and a
| challenge to the married ladies. 1t
| implies that they are sedentary fat
| heads, and that there is something in
| so. This taunt is really an old one.
| The feminists have been making it
for years; They say, that the mod
ern married woman has nothing to
| an, that she is apt to degenerate
mentally and physically. The con-
servatives say that this is not true.
They say that any woman who mar
capacity, runs her household and
raises four or five children in a
creditable manner is no fat-head.
| And this is certainly true. She is
often the brainieSt and most i'm
portant member Of the family or
ganization.
But there is undoubtedly a grow
ing tendency for the American wom-
an not to do her housekeeping or
even her embarrassing herself. She
nursemaid, and in the larger cities
the schools take almost complete
charge of the children after they are
five years old. That modern house
keeping and motherhood are no long
er the skilled and arduous profess
sions they once were is shown by
the fact that a large and increas-
ing number of married women who
have children hold jobs at the same
time. You can find a few of these
and many of them in Journalism and
the arts. A good many of these
! married working women are not
driven primarily by necessity, but
and idleness of married life and
have sought other employment, often
In the face of objections on the part
of the husband, who, egotistically
the family. Only too often these
women have no training for work.
1t must be admitted, then, that
while marriage is an all-sufficient
life occupation in some cases. IN
others it is not. Whether it is or
on circumstances, and partly on the
woman's inclinations and aptitudes:
Some women like and have talent for
housekeeping and embarrassing, and
aptitude. 1t certainly seems fair
that these latter should be taught
other professions or trades, and
should have as good chance as men
have to develop their mind and
bodies by work and experience. They
with sedentary fat-headedness espe-
cially if they marry, men who nave
enough money to hire cooks and
nursemaids Thus argue the fem
Train Girls to Work
The solution, they say. is to train
girls, the same as boys, for definite
occupations. If a woman desires to
say, let her prepare herself for that
as profession and really. devote
her time to it. And If she does not
feel a desire to make those things
her main occupation, even though
they are to form an incidental part
Of her life, let her be prepared for
some other occupation-for bust
ness, journalism, art, medicine, So
cial service, or any of the other oc-
equations which offer constantly
growing opportunities to women.
This seems sound enough, but, as
sociologists are pointing out, the
thing which is threatened Is that
ancient and revered institution, the
home Will a generation of young
women trained for trades and pro-
fessions, establish homes at all?
VIII thew NOT like Fannie Hurst, re-