HUSBAND-GRABBING AND WIFE-RIGHT.
The Latest Sociological Development
The Legislature of Indiana lias at presenb before it a very remarkable bill, which is notable as an attempt to bring the law into harmony with the moral sense of the
community. It is a bill for tho legalisation of wilful murder under certain circumstances'. It declares that whenever the seducer of a woman is slain either by her father, her husband, or her brother, the homicide shall be regarded simply as a misdemeanor, or be punishable only by a tine witltout imprisonment. " Seduction " in Indiana, of course, we take to mean seduction in the worst sense of the term
—fcliab is, seduction followed by desertion and disgrace, seduction accomplished. by fraud or force. It would be absurd to make it apply to cases where fcwo adults voluntarily enter into relations which may be described as a marriage without legal or religious sanction. This legalisation of private vengeance, which strikes many as retrograde, is in reality a natural and healthy reaction against the abominable iiulillerence with which society lias acquiesced in the ruin of women as part of the natural and necessary amusement of man. To make seduction a capital offence would be loss efficacious. The woman whose life has been blighted would seldom face the ordeal of a public trial, and the more relined tho victim the less chance of the criminal being brought to justice. The Indiana proposal has at any rate a fine old Hebraic flavour about it, recalling the avenger of blood and cities of refuge, and we should not be much .-surprised if it wore placed on the Statutebook of the State.
Thoi'c is n story told of an OKoollont Methodist preacher in Georgia, whoso .sister was ruined by a scoundrel In another part of the State. Out- good Methodist shouldered a shotgun, saddled his horse, rode 230 miles through the woods, shot the seducer dead at sight, and then rode back, hoik.1 daring to do him harm, returning in time to take his usual place in the pulpit on Sunday. He was never interfered with qither by the sheriff or by his ecclesiastical mincrioi'd. His conduct wns regarded not only ;is natural, but as in the highosb degree public-spirited and praiseworthy. The lending ease in America, however, is that of General Sickles, who deliberately shot his wife's paramour through the hoad in the public -treat at Washington and escaped scot free. The paramour, Barton Key. was the son of the man who wrote The Star Spangled Banner. Public opinion sided will) Sickles, threy lawyers defended him, the jury acquitted him, and lie was afterwards sent as Minister of the United States to Madrid. In this country there' is less respect paid to the irregular executioner of natural 'justice: Wo doubt whether, if Mr Crawford had shot Sir diaries Dilke dead at tlio door of tho Reform 'Club, any jury in London would have refused to return a verdict of wilful murder. U, however, the co-respondent had boon surprised at Warren-street his summary extinction would probably have boon followed by an acquittal. In Ireland, where the light of. private vengeance is recognised more widely than in the United Kingdom, the man who slew the seducer would come under ; the same comprehensive unwritten law which extends an amnesty to the landlord-slayer and moonlight murderer. There were few who did not approve of the assassination of Lord Leitrhn, and there is a very widespread feeling of disgust that others have not shared his fate. Archbishops, Bishops, and even the law officers of the Gx'own and Cabinet Ministers have not hesitated to declare that any landlord or agent who abused his position in order to corrupt the wives and daughters of his tenants ought to be shot ; lint probably if the just sentence wore executed, the avenger would be hunted down by the public prosecutor. One consolation, however, would be afforded him. No Irish jury would ever condemn the hero who risked his neck to save the countryside from a monster. A much more remarkable sociological development, and one that is much less defensible, is the theory that husband - grabbers may be killed as legitimately as seducers. A husband-grabber, it should be explained, is a woman who marries a man who has previously had children by another woman, without having the consent of his deserted mistress. A very remarkable case tried in France last week shows a tendency to regard husbandgrabbing as' a capital offence. An officer in the French army, after living for several years with a mistress by whom he had three children, deserted'her and married another. He made his cast-off mistress an allowance, which after some scenes he ultimately stopped.' The discarded one, savage with jealousy 'and suffering from actual destitution, sent her 12-year-old' son with a revolver to kill the woman who had taken her mothers place. He tramped to town and arrived in rags with bleeding feet at his father's house. His father received him kindly, fed him and clothed him'.1 The boy waited his opportunity and fired shot after shot into his father's wife. He wounded her seriously, but not fatally. On his arrest his mother wrote : " He has not killed her. That'l regret. He has tried to do his duty. I give him my blessing. I demand to share in the punishment for the vengeance which I devised." They were tried for attempted murder. The facts were clear. Neither mother nor son attempted' to disguise, their guilt. But the jury acquitted them unanimously. The reason is obvious. in the eyes of the jurors a husband-grabber has no rights. She is as. a land-grabber in Ireland an outlaw — hoiitit humani -generic,' whose removal by her evicted predecessor is no crime: The analogy is very close between the ethics of husband-grabbing and landgrabbing.: The deserted mistress and . the evicted lenant,have ,been far.more cruelly wronged by the faithless husband and the. ruthless landlord than. by the' new wife or the new tenant, buti it is against the latter, not against the former,that vengeance is usually directed. A dumb instinct guides them in both cases, and the net result of their action may possibly be the legal recognition of rights which are at ■present but unreclressed wrongs. Without going the length of the French doctrine, that the husband-grabber may be sliot at sight, it is obvious that immense good would result from the establishment of the ( doctrine of wife-right. At present husband-grabbing goes on all round to the complete ignoring of the prior wife right vested in the first mistresses of the .eligible bridegrooms. If women could but be got to boycott the husband-grabber they would considerably improve the position of their sex. In some rare cases women are sufficiently public-spirited to recognise the doctrine of wife-right in other than their own persons; but the cases are few in which a woman would refuse a good match because her suitor had already conferred upon another woman the responsibilities of bearing his children. One remarkable case recently came before us. An Anglo-Indian civilian in Burmah recently came home married, and returned with his bride to his : duties in Burmah. One day a Burmese
lady called at the office, "Who is she ?"' inquired Mrs— of her attendant. "0h,.:-, that was master's Burmese wife." Mrs —— ■••' packed up her boxes, and when her husband' '' returned,' she said, " How dare you marry- . mo when you have already a woman. who is morally your wife ? I leaveby the next mail !" And leave she did, dis- J playing a resolution that throws the famous. •■ repudiation of land-grabbing by Murty Hynes far into the shade. Many devices have been tried for improving the morals of society, but hitherto they have mot with, : but indifferent success. Perhaps the culti-. vntion .of a healthy detestation of husband.-' ■■ grabbing and husband-grabbers might contribute materially to the good work Wives at present alone have rights. They- < are like Irish leaseholders. Mistresses arelike tenants at will. But even tenants at will have now tenant right, and if husband-grabbing becomes unpopular, w'io knows but some matrimonial Mr Gladstone will arise who will confer upon, tenants at will the full measure of that . security which at present is the exclusive privilege of tho holder of a contract under seal?—"PallMall Gazette."
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Bibliographic details
Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 107, 7 May 1887, Page 1 (Supplement)
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1,377HUSBAND-GRABBING AND WIFE-RIGHT. Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 107, 7 May 1887, Page 1 (Supplement)
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