ETHICS OF BREACH CASES.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 130, 2 June 1923, Page 9

ETHICS OF BREACH CASES.

I TEMPER NO EXCUSE. JUDGE'S APHORISMS. (From Our Special Correspondent.) I LONDON, April 19. Our judges seem bent on delivering themselves from the bench in Baconian fashion, and of late we have had much philosophy' delivered to lis from that eminence on a subject which lies dose to the great human heart of the British public—and other pulilics. An occasion of the kind was furnished yesterday iii the courts by a breach of promise case, in which the lady sued I her fiance, who admitted the promise to " j marry, but alleged that he was justified in breaking it because she had behaved »i insultingly towards his mother and had * a violent temper. The gentleman's (mother was so deaf that it required some trouble to elicit evidence from her, . I but the judge managed to elicit from her the confession that while she had no objection to- her son's marrying she I wanted him to marry in "time." , The judge inquired of the defending' ' counsel what was the justification for ' breaking off? Was it the disclosure of character and temperament generally ! which unfitted her for matrimony? If defendant had idiosyncracies which rendered this woman's character and temperament unsuited to him, he should have thought of that before. Counsel said he had to show that the woman was an unsuitable person for the defendant. To this the judge replied: You have to show more than that. Are you not putting character and temperament on the basis of disease? Supposing a man said: "I lothe colds in the head, and this girl always has a cold in the head." The defendant's counsel replied that he would not he defending the case in such circumstances. \ The Judge: Supposing a man says: "I like a woman of mild, docile character, who will acknowledge mc as lord and master, and bow down to my every , wish, and I have not engaged, to a , woman who has a mind of her own '_ and wishes herself to be lord and master, and that I should bow down to her wishes." What of damages there? I should think a farthing 1 damages. j The Judge: Why a farthing? Why should defendant say, "She has such a '. temper that I will not marry her," though she is fit to marry 999 men out ' of a thousand? A woman will be cross . if an appointment is not kept with her. . From the time of P>e has there ever j been a woman who has not been angry (■ if a man has made an engagement with c her and has forgotten it? I think I ought to rule that yon have c no case to go to the jury, but though I n think that, I shall let you take the s jury' 3 verdict, and rule upon it afterrl wards. 1 shall ask the jury whether ', trey are satisfied that the lady, by reason t ! of her bad temper, was unfit for matri- .- jmony generally. _ i It was in his summing up that air. c I Justice Swift philosophised at large on -(the ethics of breach of promise cases f 'His pronouncement was that jt was r.oc 1 enough for defendant to show that the f (woman, in some respects, did not come -lup to his expectations. Nobody who ..as .'engaged to be married ever did come up ito expectations. .... , ~ ! Love was proverbially blind. \o doubt r [members of the jury knew what it was 'to have courted an angel, and found 7lout afterwards that she was a mere human woman like the j Everybody who started on the other • <=ide of'thirty started with the idea that the lady was perfect and without flaw, and that no woman, since Kve at any • rate, had ever been created anything 1 like her. i Vet everybody knew that other men 3 'wives were sometimes perfect fiends in : temper. The fact, lew ever, that a woman had a temper did not render her .unfit for matrimony, or half the population of the world would never In.ye jbeen born. Half the wives in the world (were women who at time- could di.-pmy a good deal of temper, j Air. Justice Swift paid that tbey had nothing to do with tho-c curious people I who heliev.il that, actions tor breach of promise for marriage chould he abolished, , that' the engagement should lie a .i,,-e period for the parties to make each other's actual trial. >o to -peak, trom j which either could draw back wrthoii. I penalty. j That was a wrong new. II »a- like any commercial contract, and the same principles must apply to its construction. After argument upon a counter-claim for the return of furniture, ihe judge made an order that the lady should return the goods or their value, subject to an agreement between the parties to settle the matter by allowing £30 as j set-off against the damages. j The lady was awarded £50 damages, I and costs.