The question as to how our ridiculous and immoral system of divorce-(I really must use those terms)-was ever permitted to come into use may be answered very briefly. The Church ordained that marriage is indissoluble, but, this being found impossible in practice, the State stepped in with a way of escape-a kind of emergency exit. But what a makeshift it was! how flagrantly dishonest, how indecent! Adultery must be committed, and, in the case of the woman claiming relief, cruelty or desertion must be added to the adultery.

To escape the degradation of an unworthy partner another partner must first be sought, home-life wrecked by the worst kind of conduct, and marriage degraded by an act of infidelity.

Now, this kind of thing is bad, and no possible shuffling can make it right; it is, indeed, so offensive to the feelings of most of us that it is very rarely, if ever, that the immoral and harmful way in which it acts is put into plain words.

The divorce law with its materialistic refusal to accept any grounds for divorce except physical infidelity, physical cruelty or desertion, makes for a low view of marriage. Further, it directly encourages perjury, in fact makes lying essential to obtaining the relief of the law. The law refuses to legalize divorce by the consenting desire of both parties-calls such a wise arrangement collusion; yet it cannot prevent what everyone knows is done in the great majority of decently conducted divorce suits, where desertion and infidelity take place by arrangement. The law is very lenient to those who can pay for the best arrangements for circumventing the law's intentions, but even in spite of the recent concessions, is still hard on the ignorant poor and low class. The law is a snob as well as a pedantic, pompous ass.

Some people may be disposed to believe that this very absurdity and unfairness of the law acts to prevent divorce. I tell you it does not; what it does do is to render decent and honest conduct quite impossible. I know this. I speak because the evil that is going on ought to be known. My own opposition to the law is not so much on account of the difficulty in obtaining a divorce-for it is not nearly so difficult as most people think; nor do I take exception, as is common with most women, to the unequal moral standard required from men and women; all this, as I have said, can easily be got over if you have money and a sufficiently clever lawyer. No, my passionate opposition is directed against the trickery and dishonesty made necessary by the law.

Let me prove this statement. To do so I will give brief details of four divorce suits which I think will speak more forcibly than any words of mine; in each case I know the facts I give are true.

Case 1.-A husband and wife, childless, desired to part, there was no physical infidelity on either side, but love had died. Both partners desired to remarry. The wife proved desertion against the husband (arranged between them beforehand by the help of a lawyer). She had to write and urgently entreat the man she desired to leave her to return! A decree for the restitution of conjugal rights was granted to her petition. Afterwards the husband had to commit adultery; (again arranged by the help of the lawyer.) He took the woman he wished to make his second wife for one night to an hotel. The decree nisi was granted. Then there was the six months waiting for the decree to be made absolute. The King's Proctor made inquiries, it was found that the wife also desired her freedom; the divorce was refused on the ground of collusion. Four people were rendered desperately unhappy, compelled either to part or to live together without marriage. This, as was to be expected, they did, and children were born, of necessity illegitimately.

Case 2.-In this case the husband loved his wife, but she had been unfaithful to him and desired freedom to re-marry her lover. There were no children. Because it was better for her, this wronged husband arranged for his wife to divorce him, prove desertion and adultery. There was a slight difficulty because it was the wife who had run away from home. However, this was easily got over. The wife wrote begging the husband to allow her to come home, representing that he had sent her away. He then had to reply refusing her request, and while desiring nothing on earth so much as her return to him, had to state he would never live with her again. An act of adultery was then necessary, and as this good and chivalrous husband was also an exceptionally moral man, he took his sister to an hotel, and the divorce was granted on this: they, of course, signing their names in the hotel register as Mr. and Mrs. X.

Case 3.-In this case the action of the parties is reversed. The husband had committed adultery and wished his freedom to re-marry, but he held a public position, and to be the guilty party in a divorce suit meant social and financial ruin. The wife was innocent, and still loved her husband, but because she felt it right to free him, an act of adultery for her (not committed) was arranged. Both the decree nisi and the decree absolute were granted. Complications arose from the fact that there were two children: as the "innocent" party custody was granted to the father, but he did not want the children. So for the six probationary months between the two decrees the children were placed with friends. Afterwards they were given back by the father to the mother.

When the decree of a divorce has been made absolute, you can fortunately do what you like. During the six months probationary period, however, the "innocent" partner (see Case 1) has to be so careful of his or her conduct, that it is really much more convenient to be the "guilty" partner. I mention this as a further proof of the absurdity of the law, and the immoral way in which it acts.

Case 4.-This case was even more curious than the three I have given. A very bad but beautiful woman had married a man younger than herself, an idealist, chivalrous, and quite unusually moral. After a few years of hell the marriage had to be ended. In kindness, and because she was a woman, the man said she had better divorce him. Desertion was proved, though it had not taken place. Trouble arose from the necessary act of adultery, as it was against the principles of the husband even to appear to commit it. The difficulty had, however, to be got over or the divorce given up. It was done in this way: the man got his married sister to go with her husband to an hotel, personating him and a woman, and signing the hotel book with his name as Mr. and Mrs. --. Now the strange fact is that though there was no kind of similarity of appearance between the brother-in-law and the husband, one being very dark and the other very fair, one being short and the other tall, identity was established and sworn to by the servant in the hotel where the night had been spent. How this was arranged I do not know, but the decree nisi and the decree absolute were granted without any difficulties arising.

Now, none of these cases are unusual, with the possible exception of No. 4; similar divorce suits are heard each session, only that the way in which the details have been arranged is carefully hidden, to prevent the losing of the case on a charge of collusion. The one absolute barrier in this land to the breaking of a marriage is that both parties want it to be broken.

It is obvious, surely, without any further argument, that laws making perjury necessary, which demand the committing of acts of, often pretended, infidelity, are immoral; nor is their immorality lessened by the fact that through the rather heavy costs of these "arranged suits,"[99:1] only the richer and more fortunate classes, as a rule, are able to bring them.

I ask if this state of things is to be allowed to go on: are decent people to be driven by the law to make use of such vile trickery? I say "decent people" advisedly, for those who bring this kind of suit are decent, wishing to act honorably and kindly, and carrying out the always difficult severing of the marriage bond with as little pain as possible. There are, I know, other divorce suits in which vindictiveness and jealousy and anger are the ruling motives, but undefended and "arranged" suits, more or less on the lines of those I have given, are becoming more and more frequent. Each law session their number is increasing. Personally, I regard this as an extraordinarily healthy sign.

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