in the United States nearly three times as fast as the population is generally regarded as the most ominous fact in regard to the family. In Connecticut in 1875 there was one divorce to each eight marriages. In Delaware, at the other end of the line, for a period of years the ratio was one to thirty-six. Senator Kyle reports the recent average for the whole country to be one divorce to every twenty marriages." It was such statistics that prompted Mr. Gladstone to write to Dr. S. W. Dike, "The facts caused me some alarm as to the future of your great country." 15 § 8. Hon. Carroll D. Wright, the skillful collector of these official statistics, in an address based upon them,1 seeks to prove that it is right and wise to grant divorces for other than "the one scriptural cause.' He says: 99 17 "The purpose of marriage as a civil institution means the security of society, and the security of society depends upon the continued sacredness of the civil contract. Every one, with perhaps few exceptions, indorses the idea that marriage should be dissolved for the one scriptural cause. But why should marriage be dissolved by legal process for this one cause? Simply because by it and through it the divine and the civil purposes of marriage have been perverted, happiness has been completely wrecked, and the moral sentiment of society outraged. This position is eminently sound, and will hold through all time. Bear in mind that it is because the civil and divine purposes of marriage have been thwarted that the scriptural cause is almost universally indorsed as a righteous one for the legal dissolution of marriage ties. In granting this position, those who adhere strictly to the ecclesiastical view of divorce abandon the whole question, for if the scriptural cause is good for the reason stated, then whatever cause eventuates in the same results must be logically as adequate for divorce as the scriptural one. 18 What is called in the latter part of this quotation "the ecclesiastical view," and in another part of the address, by a slip of the pen, "the Mosaic law," and in the earlier part of the above quotation more correctly "the one scriptural cause," refers, as the context shows in each case, to what may be more exactly described as the law of Christ, by whom, rather than "Moses" or "ecclesiastical" authority," the one scriptural cause" is proclaimed. When the Christian has before him a specific law of Christ," he has something far better than his own or other human inferences. Our imperfect reason should be used only on matters of which the perfect reasoner and universal king has not spoken. However much an individual here and there may be inconvenienced by the refusal of absolute divorce from an uncongenial marriage (I am making no argument against legal separation from bed and board), the divorce law of Christ will surely accomplish the greatest good of the greatest number. Certainly our weaker laws, which allow divorce for more than one cause and have so caused a phenomenal multiplication of divorces, have not proved their superiority to Christ's law by their results.* § 9. It may be true that divorces have multiplied in the United States partly because emancipated American womanhood will bear less treason and abuse than her sisters in other lands and her sisters of former generations in this land. There is force also in the claim that what becomes divorce in our land may become something worse in other lands. But whether or not our family life is really as much worse than formerly, as much worse than other lands, as statistics suggest, they show at least a status of the family that is far from satisfactory, one that loudly calls for speedy remedies. In 1886 there were 25,535 divorces involving 21,000 children. 20 *The reader should not fail to read Mr. Wright's argument as given more fully in Appendix. Every section of the country was about equally involved. The largest ratio of divorces to marriages was in the North and West, but the largest increase in the ratio was in the South. What can be done about it? Remedies for Customs. § 10. The remedy most urged-a uniform national law on polygamy, marriage, and divorce: that is, a constitutional amendment-has not been favored Lax Divorce by the anti-divorce leader, Dr. S. W. Dike. Others also have hesitated in the fear that Congress would not pass a law equal to the best of the State laws." But Senator Kyle makes a strong argument for it on the ground that it would at least remove the scandal that a marriage may now be legal in one State and the children resulting from it legitimate, while in another State the same marriage is invalid and the children illegitimate. It will be a long time before State commissions can be expected to untangle all such cases, and with the added urgency of the Mormon problem a strong case is made in favor of earnest effort to secure a national constitutional law. Dr. Dike favors national action in the case of the District of Columbia and the Territories, in which last some of the worst abuses have existed; for instance, Oklahoma, with the silent consent of Congress, is offering divorces on ninety days' residence and for fourteen causes, to attract “divorce colonies. The Territorial Secretary, mistaking the motive of my inquiry, writes with the glibness of an auctioneer, "Courts grant divorces readily on good cause shown." § 11. All defenders of the family favor the State commissions on uniform marriage and divorce laws as a method which may at last accomplish the desired result, if the amendment should fail or be delayed, and which will accomplish beneficial results at once in many States in any case. Nineteen States, containing about half the national population, had appointed such commissions up to the date of the National Divorce Reform League's report for 1894. § 12. Hon. Carroll D. Wright, in the address already quoted, suggests that when in divorce proceedings criminality has been proved the guilty party shall be indicted in a criminal court and duly punished. § 13. He suggests also that, as in some foreign states, the granting of divorces shall be resisted by a state officer appointed for the purpose, on the ground that the defense of the family is a duty of the state. § 14. He further suggests that law might make divorce and remarriage thereafter more difficult." People will "marry in haste" so long as they need not "repent at leisure." § 15. He also suggests that methods of procedure and the administration of divorce laws might be improved. During the year covered by the National Divorce Reform League's report for 1894, eleven States in this or other ways improved their laws of marriage and divorce. The divorce agitation led by Dr. Dike, by quickening public conscience, has apparently arrested the tendency to laxity in divorce laws, and turned the tide somewhat in the other direction-so encouraging further agitation. § 16. And let us remember with hope and joy, that nineteen-twentieths of the marriages do not end in divorces but are mostly unions of fidelity and affection, the husband, a house-band indeed, and the wife, as her name implies, a weaver of love cords. Through the warp of heart cords Shoots the woof of sweet words, And the shuttle that weaves them is love. Fairer robes this affords Than have princes and lords; Less only than angels above. Through the changes of life By the side of the love-driven loom; While the bright threads are rife, And she weaveth the beauty of home. WILBUR F. CRAFTS: Wife. § 17. It is appropriate at this point, before leaving the subject of marriage, to note an alleged increase of what one of the magazines calls, "girl bachelors." Bachelors. When few occupations were open to women, no doubt many women married without even esteem, much less affection, merely for support. This was prostitution in disguise, of which another case is marrying for luxury without love. Self-supporting women are becoming more numerous," and so fewer women marry unloved and unworthy men. This prevents many illassorted marriages, few happy ones. Its remedy is not lectures to the "girl bachelors," but the betterment of the young men, many of whom are both physically and morally unfit to be husbands. § 18. But there is an increasing tendency to bachelorhood, it is declared, even among reputable men, said to be due to the extravagant style in which girls expect to live. (A heavy tax on bachelors has been seriously proposed in several legislatures to correct this tendency.) The tendency and its alleged cause we believe should be opposed: the tendency as unwholesome, the excuse as untrue. For every worthy man there is a worthy woman ready to make a humble and happy home. Neither man nor woman can usually attain to life's best possibilities |