DIVORCE LAWS.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXXI, Issue LXII, 11 May 1912, Page 10

DIVORCE LAWS.

The secretary of the Divorce Law Reform Union,' of which Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is president, has forwarded a circular relative to the aims of the union, which are thus summarised: 1. Cheapening the cost of divorce proceedings, so that it may be brought within the reach of all classes —tne cost at present practically denying this relief to the greater portion oi the community. 2. Placing the sexes on an equal footing as regards offence and relief in matters of divorce —thus adopting the course which has been followed by nearly every other civilised country. 3. Discouraging the present system of permanent separation without the power of re-marriage, with its necessary encouragement of social irregularities, bigamy, and illegitimacy; and by making all separations convertible. into divorce decrees after the lapse of three years. 4. Extending the causes for which divorce may be obtained to include malicious desertion, incurable insanity, and chronic alcoholism —in these respects again following the progressive lead of other great countries. It is claimed by the union that the reform of the English divorce laws is a matter which vitally affects the lives and happiness of many thousands of people within the United Kingdom. But the full effect of this important reform is not so narrow or local, nor may it be regarded with indifference by any portion of the Empire. There is, first of all, a close connection between the divorce legislation of the Mother Country and that of the dominions, and the reform of the English laws towards bringing them more into line with the course adopted by practically every other Protestant country will assuredly carry great weight with the colonial Legislatures. But in two other respects the state of the English divorce laws more indirectly affects many residents in the colonies:

Firstly—Many persons residing in the colonies, who have not abandoned their English domicile, are still subject to the English laws of divorce.

Secondly—According to British law, a wife acquires the domicile of her husband from the time of her marriage, all questions of divorce, so far as she is concerned, being thenceforth regulated by the English statutes on the subject. The state of the English divorce law is thus a matter of prime importance to those colonial women who may marry Englishmen.

The secretary of the union states that literature on the subject will be forwarded on application to the office, 20, Copthall-avenue, London, E.C.