h 184 divorces for each 100,000 of population. For the whole
country we averaged 73 per 100,000 of population. Japan alone leads us
with 215, while England and Wales had only 2. England grants divorce
only for infidelity; and on the man's side it must be accompanied by
cruelty; all divorce cases must be tried in London, and the expense,
never less than two hundred dollars, is prohibitive for the poor.
Meantime, England grants many separation orders; and it seems sure that
the Royal Commission, which has been taking evidence for the past three
years, will favor a freer system of divorce.

[54] See _Statistics of Marriage and Divorce_, prepared by the Bureau of
the Census, beginning in 1906, and published in 1910.

While divorce is increasing steadily all over the world, and most
rapidly in the most intelligent and progressive sections, the subject is
so bound up with our most deep-seated prejudices that it is difficult to
secure any intelligent thinking on the subject. Thus, most people think
Sioux Falls, in South Dakota, and Reno, Nevada, are places of free
divorce, but the fact is that twenty-one other States have a higher
divorce rate than South Dakota; and fourteen have a higher rate than
Nevada. So, too, the impression that divorces spring from hasty action
is certainly wrong, for in 46.5 per cent. of those for which we have
records there had been a separation of more than three years before the
divorce was granted. The idea that people generally seek divorces that
they may marry some one else seems also unfounded, since in the cases
for which we have records, less than forty per cent. remarry within a
year.

There are three main objections which one hears urged against free
divorce. The first is that organized society rests on the family, and
with free divorce anarchy would ensue. In reply, it is pointed out that
the same argument was used to support kings, aristocracies and a
universal church. All these have been set aside, in many parts of the
earth, and society seems even more stable than before. The love of men
and women is probably more powerful and less in need of adventitious
support than either patriotism or religion.

In the second place, it is claimed that children will suffer when
parents separate. It is replied that this is true, but they were already
suffering when parents had ceased to love each other. The fact that
children are involved in only two out of five divorces seems to indicate
that chil