WIFE’S LETTERS

Waipukurau Press, Volume XXVIII, Issue 73, 20 March 1933, Page 3

WIFE’S LETTERS

HUSBAND’S ADMISSION QUESTION OF RIGHTS SYDNEY, March 10. The other day in a Divorce Court case here a husband who was bringing suit on the ground of his wife’s alleged misconduct, made a rather j&urprising admission. He mentioned quite incidentally in giving evidence that he had opened his wife’s letters. “Did you generally open them?” asked the judge; and the plaintiff made answer that he considered that ho had a right to do so. Later in the case the man mentioned casually that he had “listened in” to his wife on the telephone. Was that a usual practice with him? Certainly. He considered that he had a right to know what his wife was saying, the impression conveyed being that sho was probably talking to other men. V I don’t know that these remarkable {admissions made much difference to the course of the ease, but they produced a considerable impression outside. The “mere 'men” whispered the story to each other as a joke, but they talked discreetly behind their hands, and I don’t think that most of them carried the tidings home. But mos u of the women who discussed it took a much more serious view of the case ■r-as well they might. One of our prominent feminists • Miss Preston Stanley—she has been a member of the Feminist Club —told

an interviewer that such a claim as this dreadful husband put forward was merely a “barbaric memory,” a tradition from the days, when primitive man carried off his wives by main force, and held them as slaves. In another interview Mrs Duncan, president of the Housewives’ Association, remarked that a man who could make such claims as these must be “living mentally 100 years back.” As a matter of fact the husband in this divorce case revealed himself as a curious survival, a vestigial relic from almost prehistoric times. He deserves some praise for his moral courage in expressing views that he must know are entirely out of keeping with the life around him and the world of whioh he forms a part. But I wonder how any human being could remain so completely' detached from social life and human progress as to cherish these barbarous superstitions about a man’s “rights” over his wife. If ever that man comes into conflict with a woman’s legal rights, he will find that the law and the courts, as well as public opinion, are arrayed on her side to an extent which he evidently does not comprehend; indeed, he may find that the “weaker vessel” of his imagination has really far less need for protection than he requires himself.