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 The Green Bag

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from an examination of individual cases

standard of morality in marriage than

as well as from the fact that about the same proportion of divorces are granted regardless of the number of statutory

to assume the responsibility for condi

grounds or their nature. People usually decide to get a divorce and then do whatever the legislature, in its wisdom,

tions in a society where marriage exists

without divorce. The scandal in the case of Haddock v. Haddock, (201 U. S. 562) while regrettable, lies with the Supreme Court.

may require of them to obtain the decree.

That ﬁve of the members of the highest

In fact, the more numerous the statutory

the less the immorality connected with

judicial tribunal of the land should be so dominated by ecclesiastical or other prejudice as to pervert the express terms of the Constitution and overrule the well established intrepretations

divorce.

formerly laid down by the same court

causes and the more liberal the procedure the less need there is for misrepresenta

tion or attempts to beat the law, and Because New York has seen

fit to require one of the parties to a marriage contract to commit adultery in order to have the marriage dissolved, instead of decreasing immorality, has resulted in forcing upon the good people of that state the stigma of having nearly ﬁve times as many cases of adultery proven against them in proportion to their population as has their sister state, Pennsylvania. A man must be trained to dogmatic conceptions of things,

when otherwise constituted, and then

attempt to justify such action by an apology of over ﬁfteen thousand words,

is, indeed, little short of scandalous. Especially is this to be condemned when such a decision is certain to work great hardship to multitudes of innocent persons and cannot possibly beneﬁt anyone further than to tickle individual prejudices. That four of the members of this court refused to concur shows

and insensible to both reason and humane impulses, who can boldly persist

how nearly this scandal came to being

in pleading for an extension of that

While the number of migratory di vorces has been greatly overestimated.

type of morality. It is only people of this class who recommend divorce without right of remarriage, little considering the con sequences of having a considerable proportion of society capable of doing anything except to lawfully marry.

avoided.

there is still a very great evil connected therewith. Statistics show that there never have been over three per cent

of the divorces granted of a migratory nature, yet there is necessarily a great

wrong committed when a citizen of one

The experience of England for over half a century with a system of this

state feels that his rights can be better

kind and the results therefrom, which are many times worse than any con dition caused by our legislation, ought to silence forever any such agitation.

because of its very strict law, has, per

The method of curing immorality by more serious immorality is no longer

popular in a civilized society.

adjudicated

elsewhere.

New

York,

haps, furnished more victims than any other state, for there are many people

in that state who have too much self respect to stoop to the act the legislature has named as the price of a divorce Some who have the means, swallowed

Personally, I had much rather assume

their pride and changed their residences

the consequences of introducing into society a condition which will raise the

to other jurisdictions. Many did not have the means to do that and they