Year: 1876

The Divorce Lawyer.


The murder of House, the divorce lawyer,
by his wife, draws attention to the sinister
means by which he amassed fortune His
was not the business by which the ordinary
divorce, with good and sufficient cause, was
obtained in the usual manner He stood as
the trap into which wives or husbands could
fall who, at their first quarrel, found an un-
scrupulous wretch ready, by jugglery of
the laws of certain States, to get man and
wife parted on short notice and at low rates.
The following case, which came to light in
1871, will illustrate of this ruffian IS favor
lite modes of obtaining a divorce:-A man
named Randolph, who left his first wife in
St Louis and later on conceived passion
for another woman In New Jersey, sought
the services of House to obtain a divorce.
The job was done for a hundred dollars.
Connecticut was chosen as the State whose
indiarubber divorce law was to be taken ad-
vantage of. On certain day in December,
1870, two men, accompanied by local law
yer of Indifferent repute, appeared before
Judge Miner in New Haven. One of the
men swore he was Randolph that he resided
in the State and that he wanted a divorce.
The other man testified to immoral conduct
on the part of the first Mrs. Randolph in
Brooklyn. The divorce was granted, and
the case would have ended like hundreds
of others had not there been some money in
the case. Randolph, on the strength OF the
bogus divorce, married his inamorata, and
her stepfather obtained an injunction against
the brides fortune, and after a short time
the gay Lothario found himself prisoner,
charged with bigamy. House was arrested
in this city and taken to New Haven,
where he was charged with subornation of
perjury. He put the amount of bail de-
manded in greenbacks in the District Attor-
ney's hands, was released and gayly returned
to New York to continue his old course of
obtaining divorces with secrecy and de-
spatch." BY system of agents, chosen
from the ''shysters' of the legal profession,
he was enabled to procure DEGREES Of divorce
in Indiana, Illinois and Connecticut, the
New York courts being too open and costly
for his nefarious system. That out Of oil
the cases in which he abused the laws of
different States he was arrested but once,
and then, as we have seen, slipped through
the fingers of justice quite easily, may be
accounted for by the fact that the State
officials cared but little SO they got their fees;
that the perjurers he hired left the neighbor-
hood of their crime precipitately, and,
above all, through that shamefacedness


II
private wrong rather than fight an
imputation on their chastity in the courts.
His career calls attention to the necessity for
uniform divorce laws through the States,
with publicity for all cases, and something
more than the oaths of two unknown parties
being required to sever the bond of mar
riage. The amount of wrong which this man
wrought, the number Of first quarrels which
his devilish readiness extended into lifelong
miseries, the number of gross creatures
whose carnal appetites he ministered to,
would cause shudder to society if they
could be recounted, and that the bullet
which ended his miserable life was fired by
the hand of woman he had picked up in
his loathsome business will not cause wide
regret.


About the circumstances of his death we
have nothing to say now. 1t will be for
jury TO decide how far the woman who shot
him dead stands accountable TO the law. She
apparently belongs to the same blonde tigress
type as Laura d. Fair, and will deserve but
little of the sympathy which the fabby-
minded who cannot see any thing but an
angel behind pretty face will be pretty sure
to extend to her as she takes her seat by her
counsel, looking as gentle as Sunday school
teacher at strawberry festival.