FEWER DIVORCES IN U.S.A.

Greymouth Evening Star, 9 July 1932, Page 8

FEWER DIVORCES IN U.S.A.

HOME IS CHEAPER. The divorce rate in the United States, recently described as the highest in the world, has been cut by 22 per cent, owing to the prevailing hard times. Judge Joseph Sabath, who in Chicago not long ago pronounced his 50,000 th decree, attributes this decrease to the shortage of ready money. ‘‘As long as there was plenty of cash for pleasure,” he says, “husbands were inclined to grow dissatisfied with their wives, and wives with their husbands. Now they have more serious things to consider, and many pleasureloving couples are finding real happiness for the first time by their own firesides.” In his district there has been a notable decline in the frequency of “gin I marriages,’ ’as he styles the hasty, weddings of couples who meet at drinking parties and then visit the nearest magistrate to be married. BehincJ- his courtroom the judge has installed a delightfully furnished “reconciliation chamber,” where he invites couples to discuss their difficulties with him. “This,” he declares, “is responsible, I believe, for the decision of thousands of couples to try again before seeking divorce.”