A BACKGROUND TO THE NEWS

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 64, 9 December 1936, Page 9

A BACKGROUND TO THE NEWS

Dean Inge on Divorce It has been said that no priest of the Church of England would marry the King and Sirs. Ernest Simpson, because Mrs. Simpson has divorced two husbands. The problem of divorce,

said Dean Inge, “is, in my opinion, the most difficult of all the problems which are now before the nation. , . It is notorious that in a large percentage of divorce cases there has been flagrant collusion, . . This frequency of collusion makes it almost impossible for the Church to draw a distinction in its treatment of divorced persons who have subsequently remarried. . . The source of the mischief is the perverse and immoral morality which is now preached as well as practised, especially by our very modern novelists, who have much to answer for in corruptingj the moral sense of the nation. The new theory of marriage seems to be, something of this kind: The marriage vow is a declaration of ardent sexual emotion; and if at any time this feeling comes to be. excited by another person, the continuance of married life becomes an outrage upon the higher, feelings, and the gratification of what used to be called lust becomes a blissful self-expression of the personality. The truth, of course, is that the marriage vow is not a declaration at all, but a promise of life-long love and fidelity. It is the most sacred and sol-, emn obligation into which a man and woman ever enter,. an obligation enforced, by every consideration of honour, ' decency, justice and religion. To say that our affections are not under the control of our wills is to bestialise, human nature and to strike at the root of the validity of all contracts. . . ” Lord Birkenhead’s View.

Speaking in the House of Lords in 1920 on Divorce Law Reform, Lord Birkenhead said: “The Act of 1857 [permitting divorce in cases of adultery] removed a jurjsdietion from the Ecclesiastical Courts which—l say it with all respect—they were ill-fitted to discharge. Their view was that marriage was and ought to be indissoluble. The Ecclesiastical Courts themselves, who laid down this doctrine with every circumstance of canonical formality, prayed in aid a number of fictions under the head of nullity which were comparable to the chicanery which disfigures our law to-day. I pass by the conjugal eccentricities of Henry VIII with the observation that they met with a good deal of indulgence from the ecclesiastics of that day, and I come to the latter part of the seventeenth century. Toward the end of the seventeenth century it was recognised that, bv the procedure of a private Act of Parliament, divorce ought to be obtainable on the ground of adultery. The principle from that moment disappeared. The principle that marriage was and ought to be indissoluble was exorcised with almost universal approval from our institutions 350 years ago. We therefore to-day approach it on the basis that marriage is not, and ought not to be, treated as being indissoluble, and I say—l hope without giving offence—that those who take, and who attempt to advocate, the other view do not live in this world; their arguments are the whisperings of the abandoned superstitutions of the Middle Ages. I assume, and I think I am entitled to do so, that 90 per cent, of your Lordships who listen to me to-night, 90 per cent., I believe, of those who are members of the House of Commons, and I think as large a proportion of the total population of these islands, are agreed that upon some grounds . . -marriage ought not to be indissoluble. That means—and let us never forget this—the definitive rejection of the ecclesiastical view ....” Hereditary Monarch.

Reference is made by the "Scotsman” to the “hereditary monarchy” of the British Commonwealth. The course of hereditary succession to the Crown has been several times interrupted and resettled by Parliament. On the deposition of Edward 11, his son, Edward 111, succeeded according to the ordinary rule of inheritance. The successor of Richard II was Henry IV, who also claimed to be heir to the Crown, but by a fictitious title. In his reign Parliament enacted “that the inheritance of the Crown . . . should be set and remain in the person of our Lord the King and in the heirs of his body issuing.” In a similar way, a new course of succession was created by Parliament with respect to Henry VII and his heirs. The Crown was by Act of Parliament entailed to Henry VII and the heirs of his body; the. right of the Crown then being in Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Edward IV. In the reign of Henry VIII, Parliament enacted still more extraordinary regulations of the succession to the Crown. Au Act limited the Crown, in default of heirs male of the King’s body, to Elizabeth and her heirs, to the exclusion of Mary. A subsequent statute excluded both Mary and Elizabeth from the succession, and contained a remarkable provision, enabling the King, in default of future children, to appoint his successor by his will or letters-patent. Seven years after, Parliament again resettled the succession, this time introducing another remarkable, innovation ; for in the case of the death of the Prince, afterward Edward VI, with issue, the Crown was to descend to Mary upon such conditions as Henry VIII by letters-patent or by his will should limit, on breach of such conditions the Crown was to go to Elizabeth; ou breach by her of conditions similarly limited, the Crown was to go to such persons as the King should direct by will or letters-patent. Parliament again interrupted the line of succession on the abdication of James 11, and again toward the end of William Ill’s reign. Mme. Lupescu.

Mme. Lupescu, the friend of King Carol of Rumania, has married a high official of the Rumanian Court Madame Magda Lupescu was born in Jassy, the daughter of a Jewish chemist named Wolff, who changed his name to Lupescu, the Rumanian equivalent, in order to get permission to practise, since there was a limit on the number of Jews allowed to enter the professions. Madame Lupescu’s mother was a Roman Catholic, and the daughter was baptised in that faith. She married an army officer, but when, in 1923, King Carol began to pay his attentions to her, she quietly divorced her husband. She is a woman of great intelligence and charm and commanding personality, and has flaming red hair. The king’s interest in her brought about estrangement from his queen, and also seemed likely to lose him his crown.. Madame Lupescu is said to have friends in all the key positions of the realm, and her own secret service.