family, as in a state, some one person must be the ultimate
ruler. Who shall decide when married people differ in opinion? Both
cannot have their way, yet a decision one way or the other must be
come to.

It is not true that in all voluntary association between two people,
one of them must be absolute master: still less that the law must
determine which of them it shall be. The most frequent case of
voluntary association, next to marriage, is partnership in business:
and it is not found or thought necessary to enact that in every
partnership, one partner shall have entire control over the concern,
and the others shall be bound to obey his orders. No one would enter
into partnership on terms which would subject him to the
responsibilities of a principal, with only the powers and privileges
of a clerk or agent. If the law dealt with other contracts as it does
with marriage, it would ordain that one partner should administer the
common business as if it was his private concern; that the others
should have only delegated powers; and that this one should be
designated by some general presumption of law, for example as being
the eldest. The law never does this: nor does experience show it to
be necessary that any theoretical inequality of power should exist
between the partners, or that the partnership should have any other
conditions than what they may themselves appoint by their articles of
agreement. Yet it might seem that the exclusive power might be
conceded with less danger to the rights and interests of the
inferior, in the case of partnership than in that of marriage, since
he is free to cancel the power by withdrawing from the connexion. The
wife has no such power, and even if she had, it is almost always
desirable that she should try all measures before resorting to it.

It is quite true that things which have to be decided every day, and
cannot adjust themselves gradually, or wait for a compromise, ought
to depend on one will: one person must have their sole control. But
it does not follow that this should always be the same person. The
natural arrangement is a division of powers between the two; each
being absolute in the executive branch of their own department, and
any change of system and principle requiring the consent of both. The
division neither can nor should be pre-established by the law, since
it must depend on individual capacities and suitabilities. If the two
persons chose, they might pre-appoint it