WOMEN WITH RIGHTS, BUT NO RESPONSIBILITIES

New Zealand Times, Volume LII, Issue 12201, 28 July 1925, Page 4

WOMEN WITH RIGHTS, BUT NO RESPONSIBILITIES

(By Francis Grabble.) Who points out the unfairness of making a'husband responsible for nia wife’s misdeeds. Furious feminists have often drawn Us-pitiful pictures of weak women oppressed and persecuted by unjust and wioked man-made laws. No doubt there was some justification for their fury in the bad old times when every penny that a married woman possessed could be taken from her by her husband’s creditors. Then even her salary, if she was earning one, belonged' to him, and he had a statutory right to beat her provided that the stick used for the purpose was no thicker than his thumb. No longer are the rods measured when the wife-beaters are brought before the magistrate. No longer can a husband touch a wife’s money or pledge her credit without her consent.

The boot is nowadays on the other foot, and there are countless respects in which the law is unjustly and even outrageously ■' unfavourable to married men;

A married man, for instance, is under an absolute obligation to support his wife in a condition appropriate to her station; whereas she is under no corresponding obligation towards him.

A wealthy woman, married to a, bedridden invalid, _ cannot be required either to live with?, him or even to contribute a farthing to her . husband’s support unless he becomes chargeable to the parish; and then, she oan only be required to pay to the guardians of the poor the cost of his maintenance in the workhouse..

Another inequality, equally glaring and more* often of practical importance, has been brought into relief by the result .of that Waterhouse case which occupied so much of the time of the courts, recently.

It was an application of the principle that a - husband iB legally liable for hiA wife’s ’’torts’ ’—for an action of hers, that is to say, for which a jury can be persuaded to award damages. The husband, in that case, had not been a party .to his wife’s proceedings. He had not even been aware of them, and nobody doubts that, if he had been aware of them, he would have disap-, proved of them, and done his beet to 6top tbem--

None the less, he can be called.upon to pay for them, and the amount of the bill presented is father more than £12,000.

Whereupon Mr Justice Shearman quoted a notable legal maxim from Selden's “Table Talk’’:-

“A man who keeps a wife iB like a man who • keeps a monkey; he is held to be responsible for the mischief die does.”

And ho added: “That is quite, silly nowadays. I wish they would alter the law.’’ • / . ■

Most certainly the law on this matter ought to be altered, not only because it is silly, but also because comparatively recent modifications of certain other laws have deprived it of all the reason that ever was for its existence. •

Marital authority ■ whiph was once so real a thing exists no longer either in fact or in law.. After it had been gradually whittled away the decision in the notorious Jackson case finally demolished the little of it that was supposed 'to have Survived.

The wife, in that case, had run away from hbrlhiishand,-'and he 1 had taken forcible measures to compel- her to return to- him. The court held that ho had exceeded his authority, and that’ any wife who. preferred to live apart l from her, husband had an indefeasible right to do so, - , A .deserted husband, that is to say, had no, righto ,but only responsibilities for actions which the iaw. forbade him even to atteittpt to control.

He could not, prevent his wife frofii taking the field with militant suffragettes. and smashing plate-glass windows, for • driving a care recklessly to the public dangers from deoeiving - the. public by lending her name ,to the fraudulent representations of a bogus company, or from circulating libellous statements. ~ -

Yet, if she chose to do any or all of these things—whether to please herself or to exasperate him—the injured parties coulff, obtain full compensationfrom him.

It is astonishing that so iniquitous a state of things should have been tolerated so long in a' country in which lawyers pride themselves that the law is the embodiment of common sense. Perhaps the swinging damages,, the' startling circumstances, and the scornful comments of the judge in this last suit will -move the Government to set matters right.

Surely our proud ' and high-spirited feminists owe .it.: to themselves to press for the removal of this grievanoe.