DIVORCE AND THE' PRIMARY CAUSES.

Auckland Star, Volume XXIX, Issue 101, 30 April 1898, Page 3 (Supplement)

DIVORCE AND THE' PRIMARY CAUSES.

OPINION. OF AN AMERICAN

JUDGE,

Under the auspices of the Oakland County Women's Christian Temperance Association the opening session, of the 'Purity Conference' was held at the V.M.C.A. Hall on March 10, 'Primary Causes of Divorce' was .the theme of Judge Gibson's address. He said education and earty traininghad a great deal to do with the prevalence of divorce. It depended upon the mothers and the teachers of the public schools to a great extent to train the minds of the young correctly in their youth so that they may become proper members of society. The Judge paid his respects to the 'club,' which he said kept many men from their homes. He declared that he was a firm believer in marriage and thought, that a law should be passed prohibiting bachelorhood. He said he would be in favour of imposing' a tax on men who remained unmarried after they were 25, and an additional penalty if they did not marry before 30. He said he could name 300 ■or 400 young men of ■ his own acquaintance in San Francisco who were unmarried and spent their time at the club. He said that when he was a young man he did not know what a club was, except the kind that was used to bat a ball. If the men were required to marrjr then most of the women would also marry, as-the men would make life miserable for them if they did not.

The speaker then went over the six grounds xipon which divorces majr be granted in California, ami held that they were all proper ones. He,said that, when the law failed, the cause lay in the failure of its officers to administer it property. The law prqvides that no divorce shall be granted Upon the uncorroborated evidence of the interested parties. In the matter of cruelty as a ground "of divorce the law provides that it shall be 'extreme cruelty.' Where a divorce is asked for on the g-rounds of habitual intemperance, wilftil neglect •or desertion, it must be shown that the conduct complained of must have lasted for a year. * ■;

The speaker thought that the foregoing restrictions on ■: divorce were stringent enough. He declared that a young' woman should be very carefxil in accepting1 an offer of niarriage. She should study the character of the man very closely, marriage it depended a good deal upon the consideration shown by the wife for the husband and the husband for the wife as to whether or not they would live happily together. Neither should expect too much of the. other.: If the man should find that his helpmeet was not all he had pictured; he should endeavour tb make her as near such as possible by kindly means, and the wife should do the sanie for her husband.