That is why I am advocating, as a first most necessary reform, simpler and more decent facilities of divorce. I plead for a greater breadth of toleration, with a more honest facing of the facts, because I have known in my experience the degradation, the falsity and the absurdities that are going on to-day; the deceptions into which everyone is driven who is unfortunate enough to have to seek relief, under the present disgraceful divorce laws, from a marriage that has failed. There are conditions which degrade and embitter and make honorable conduct very difficult.
A great number of people, regarding marriage as a mystical and, therefore, unbreakable sacrament, object to divorce under any circumstances whatever. This is the case in Catholic countries, such, for instance, as Spain, the land I know and love so well. Such an attitude I can understand and respect, though I do not consider it a practical proposition, and know, moreover, that indissoluble marriage, in some ways, works very harmfully. It prevents hasty marriage. In Spain marriage is regarded as the gravest and most momentous step in life; but this caution does not altogether work out for good in the way one might expect.
I recall a conversation with a Spanish friend on this question. We were speaking of the great numbers of young Spaniards who did not marry. I asked my friend the reason of this. He answered: "You see we have no divorce in this land as you have in England, that makes us afraid now we have begun to think, we hesitate and hesitate, then we take a mistress while we are deciding, but it is easier and less binding to live like that, and we keep going on and put off marrying, sometimes put it off until it is too late." In Spain the illegitimate birth-rate is the highest of any country in Europe.
We must accept, then, that indissoluble marriage fails in practice, and the society which enforces it commits self-injury by setting up a standard of conduct impossible to maintain; and further, one that acts in deterring the more thoughtful from marriage and leaves the protected institution to the more reckless, who do not consider consequences.
Now, when once we do accept this, admit the principle of divorce and acknowledge that in certain circumstances the bond of marriage may be severed, at once the aspect of the question changes: it becomes a matter of practical adjustment, so that what is needed is decision and regulation of the conditions under which divorce should be allowed, so that they may meet best the needs of men and women in the society and, at the time, in which they live. I am very anxious to show the difference between the practical and the conventional attitude toward this problem. It is to be wished that this question of divorce could be approached free from the falseness of the old prejudices of religious intolerance and of sentimentality.
The great and pressing need of reform is being widely discussed at the present time. I note with a mixture of amazement and fear that practically in every argument the opinion universally held appears to be that the relief given should be as limited as possible; it is still being taken for granted that free divorce in this country is neither attainable nor desirable, and, indeed, that any extension of the grounds of divorce would act against the sanctity of marriage. I say I note this attitude with fear, because it seems to me that the triumph of prejudice and ignorance here is a most serious symptom of the degradation of our moral outlook and the poverty of our faith in the institution of marriage.
"Divorce is relief from misfortune, not a crime," to quote from the admirable statute book of Norway, a saying which should be one of universal application in divorce. And this relief must be granted, not merely as an act of justice to the individual; it is called for equally in the interests of society.
The moral code of any society ought to meet the needs of its members. But the needs change as time goes on, and moral codes must then also change or they become worn-out and useless. That society which is unwilling to modify its laws to fit new conditions drives its members into defiance of the law and acts directly as a cause of immorality. It were well to remember this as we come to question our laws of divorce. There can be no possible doubt that as the law stands at present it does not meet the needs of those people who claim its relief; while further, the most superficial knowledge of the situation proves how harmfully and immorally the law acts.
II
It is, of course, very much better that marriage should be as permanent as possible, and any society is obviously justified in bringing any moral pressure to bear to make people realize the seriousness of the relationship and the importance of keeping it permanent when possible. But it is certainly no part of the right or duty of society to use force to compel people to remain in the marriage relationship, when it becomes so repugnant to them that the conditions of the marriage cannot be continued. All that society has the right then to demand is that all the obligations which have been assumed shall be honorably fulfilled. But a relationship registered in mistake or under delusion should be subject to revision, and, with certain safeguards, to dissolution, otherwise the standard of morality is degraded and marriage itself is brought to contempt, and can be used, as indeed too often it is, as a cloak of protection for every kind of immorality.