PUBLICITY AND DIVORCE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20291, 27 December 1927, Page 15

PUBLICITY AND DIVORCE.

GREAT INCREASE IN PETITIONS. QUESTION RAISED IN COMMONS. (From Oue Own Correspondent.) LONDON. November 19. The chief feature of the return of civil judicial proceedings for 1926 was the great increase in the matrimonial petitions. They were 3783, the highest since 1920, and an increase of 572, or 17.8 per cent., over 1925. Matrimonial cases tried at the assizes were 1194, an increase of 312, or 35.4 per cent., on the previous year. There was a decrease in the total of the three divisions of the High Court of 4.8 per cent., from 112,071, compared with 106,738 in 1925 . In the Chancery Division there was a decline of 5.7 per cent, to 7221, and in the King’s Bench a decrease of 5.6 per cent, to 94.981. In the probate, divorce, and Admiralty division there was an increase) of 14.3 per cent, to 4536, due to the increase in the matrimonial causes. Last year, in London, 1114 husbands and 1648 wives secured decrees of divorce, a total of 2762, an increase of 105 compared with the previous year. In the district registries 35 husbands and 62 wives’ petitions were granted. During th© year 1061 decrees nisi for dissolution of marriage were absolute on husbands’ petitions, and 1493 on wives’ petitions. The King’s Proctor intervened during the year in 27 suits for dissolution, and during the year 29 decrees were rescinded at his instance. The question of publicity in divorce proceedings has been raised in the House of Commons. A Conservative member considers that “ the rapid increase of divorce cases in this country” sine© the recent Act came into force is due to the ‘‘lack of publicity '’ caused by its operation, and he concludes that the Act is a mistake, as “ he always thought it was.” The Home Secretary replied that as the Act had only been in force' for a year it was too early to dray conclusions. AN EMPTY ARGUMENT. “ We have noticed another explanation of the increase in matrimonial petitions,” says the Morning Post, “ namely, the facilities given to poor people under the rules which came into force in 1926, and in any case the increase in petitions does not appear to be very great. But, whether oi not, it seems to us altogether wrong—whether from a legal or moral point of v i ew _that the fear of publicity should be used to frighten people away from the divorce courts. The argument really is that the parties—whether guilty or inno-cent-should be so intjmidated by_ the fear of seeing the most intimate details of their private life exposed to the public gaze as to make them shrink from availing themselves of their rights under the law of the land. That does not seem to us a.i arguable proposition. If divorce is too easy,let the law be amended. If the present generation is less moral than previous generations (which we do not believe). let the churches reform it if they can ; but do not let us resort to an inquisition more hideous and unseemly than exists in any other country in the world on the pica that such barbarous treatment (of innocent and guilty) is an aid to morality.”