had to be cruelty besides; while the man
could be divorced for the first-named cause. No such rule has ever
prevailed in any State of this country. Desertion and failure to
support, on the other hand, are much more easily proved by the wife.
In short, it is not too much to say that in all matters of divorce she
stands in a position of advantage.

[Footnote 1: _U.S. Labor Bulletin_, Special Reports on Divorce, 1860,
1908.]

The same thing is in practice true as to marriage. Under liberal
notions, prevailing until recently in all our States, certainly in all
where the so-called common-law marriage prevails, it is extremely easy
for a woman to prove herself the lawful wife of any man she could
prove herself to have known, and sometimes even without proving the
acquaintance. The "common-law" marriage, by the way, is not, so far as
I can determine, the English common law, nor ever was. If any common
law at all, it is the Scotch common law, the English law always having
required a ceremony by some priest or at least some magistrate, as
does still the law of New England. Under the influence of the State
Commissioners for Uniformity of Law this matter has been amended in
the State of New York, so that if there be no ceremony there must at
least be some written evidence of contract, as in the case of a sale
of goods and chattels under the statute of frauds; the contract of
marriage being thus, for the first time in New York, made of equal
importance with that of the sale of goods to the value of one hundred
dollars. Much difference of opinion exists between the South and the
North upon this point, the Southern view being more remarkable for
chivalry, and the Northern for good sense. Southern members of the
National Conference of Commissioners claimed that any such law would
result in disaster to many young girls; that if they had to travel
ten, twenty, or thirty miles to find a minister or justice of the
peace they would in many cases dispense with the formality or be
impatient of the delay; and that anyhow on general principles any
unmarried man who had seen an unmarried young woman two or three times
ought to be engaged to her if he was not. The Northern Commissioners,
on the other hand, were desirous of protecting the man, and especially
his legitimate widow and children, from the female adventuress, which
view the South again characterized as cynical. There is probably
something to be said for both sides.

Coming finally