much progress made in spiritual union than the initiation of a new movement. Unity is growing and will grow whether organic union is ever secured or not. The duty of all Christians is, as we have formerly said, to discourage all peculiarities of worship, government, and doctrine which are foreign to a catholic spirit, to avoid all that is provincial and eccentric, to elevate prayers, hymns, music, preaching and creeds to the level on which all Christians can hold communion with God and with each other. When religious life and worship are essentially the same, denominational groupings survive for convenience and not for division.

SOCIOLOGICAL NOTES.

THE REPORT ON MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE.1

It will be impossible, at this early date after the appearance of this Report in print, to give as full an account of its new and abundant material as one could desire. But enough can be done to direct thought to its great subjects and to the work itself, which fortunately can be obtained without cost on application either through members of Congress or directly to the Department of Labor at Washington.

The official history of the Report is recited in the introduction. It begins with the appearance in Congress, in January, 1884, of petitions prepared in accordance with the suggestions made in a letter in the New York "Tribune" in the previous December. After various vicissitudes, the Senate almost unanimously supporting the measure, and a large but insufficient number in the House being in its favor, it finally passed the House and became a law March 3, 1887. An additional sum was given the Department in 1888, to enable the Commissioner to complete the work, he receiving $17,500 in all directly for this purpose, though he had full power to use his regular appropriations for it. The work has taken two years and a half from the time of the first appropriation and preliminary study to its final issue in the printed volume, which comes nearly six years after its first definite proposal by the friends of the National Divorce Reform League. Its idea, however, is much older than this, having been suggested for the Census of 1880.

The Report gathers up nearly everything in the statistical works of Europe relating to marriage and divorce to supplement the collections of its special agent, Dr. E. M. Hartwell, of Johns Hopkins University, which were mainly confined to the period of twenty years in the United States, the direct subject of investigation. It has, therefore, the character of a thesaurus on its immediate subject, which is "Statistics of and relating to Marriage and Divorce." While the European matter, which takes nearly one hundred pages, does not cover Europe completely, it greatly increases the information previously in print in many scattered official publications, and in the little publications of Bodio and Bertillon, be

1 A Report on Marriage and Divorce in the United States, 1867 to 1886; including an Appendix relating to Marriage and Divorce in certain countries in Europe. By Carroll D. Wright, Commissioner of Labor. February, 1889. Washington: Government Printing Office. 1889. Pp. 1074.

sides bringing it together in clear arrangement. The laws of divorce and statistics of Canada are also included in the Appendix. The American matter dwarfs all our former statistical information on the subject of Divorce almost into insignificance. While it is not a report on Marriage and Divorce laws, it is by far the best source of information on these subjects, so far as it is necessary to know them in order to understand the statistics. We have now an official digest of these condensed into one hundred pages so ingeniously made by the use of headings, tables, etc., that more is compassed than can be found in several times the space elsewhere, and arranged so that any desired point is quickly found. Unusual pains have been taken to secure accuracy, as none of the existing compendiums were found free from errors. A vast amount of work is often condensed into single tables. The table showing ages of consent, those regarding marriage licenses, the officers issuing them, the fees prescribed, the methods of returns, are good examples of condensed, yet clear showing. The exhibit of Divorce laws is equally clear and full. The system of registration and publication of returns of marriages and divorces is clearly shown wherever any exists. But in the case of marriages, unfortunately, the want of any system worthy the name is the great discovery in most States.

The general tables of the Report are eight in number. Marriages and divorces throughout the country are first given for each of the counties by years for the twenty years 1867-1886. Statistics of divorce

are practically complete, and enable each locality in the country to compare its own condition with that of any other. The causes of divorce, not merely the statutory causes, but the great variety created by the interpretations of the courts, are shown in extenso. These in some States count as many as sixty, and in one seventy-five. That is to say, the variations in practical application of a dozen or less statutory causes reach this number. The duration of marriage before divorce for the several States and Territories and by classified causes of divorce is shown for each year. This average for the whole country is 9.17 years. Where the husband was the applicant, it was only 8.97 years, but in case of the wife 9.27. The largest single number of divorces for any one year after marriage was 27,909, and these were those who had lived together four years before divorce. The next largest, 27,250, took place three years after marriage; while 21,525 sought divorce in two years, and 15,622 after one year. "It is surprising," says the Report, "to find that 25,371 couples, after living together twentyone years or more, were obliged to seek divorce." The average duration of married life before divorce in this class is found to be 26.95 years. In any deductions as to the period at which divorce is most likely to occur we should remember that the number of married persons declines as we recede from the date of marriage, so that 25,371 divorces after twentyone years of married life must be a far greater percentage than the number would be twenty years earlier. This adds to the terrible significance of the figures relating to divorce late in life. In many of the older States, the average age at divorce is increasing considerably, and it has risen more than half a year for the entire country. In Massachusetts in 1885, it was nearly thirteen years. In Arkansas the average for the twenty years is only 6.48. The table showing the place of marriage of the divorces is very valuable. Its exhibit is in four particulars. It shows for each State the number of those divorced who were married

in the State, those who were married in some adjoining State, those who were married in some other of the United States, and those married in a foreign country. There were only 7,739 of the last class in the entire period. Still another table gives the number of children in those cases where the facts were known. A study of selected counties in a dozen States is made with reference to the relation of intemperance to divorce, and various other points are treated, such as the number of applications rejected, and the number of cases in which notice to the defendant was made by publication.

Unfortunately the condition of the returns of marriage are such that a very few States only supply really complete figures regarding marriages, and a few more any that are nearly so. It is impossible, so soon after the Report has become available, to go into its contents as fully or thoroughly as can be done later. But some points which it has brought out can be noted now.

1. The primary fact that has thus been established is, of course, that of the wide prevalence and increase of divorces in our Western civilization. A generation ago it would have been thought incredible that in the twenty years, 1867-1886, there would be granted 328,716 divorces in the United States, or that over 25,535 could be granted in a single year. Yet this is the fact. And divorces increased from 9,937 in 1867 to 25,535 in 1886, which is more than twice as fast as the increase of population. The movement is exceedingly steady from year to year. Dividing into periods of five years each, we get a safe comparison. The second period has 27.9 per cent, more divorces than the first; the third 30.3 per cent. more than the second; and the fourth 31.4 more than the third. The only exceptions to the general increase, when the statistics are taken in quinquennial periods, are in Maine, Connecticut, and Vermont. New York and one or two other sections show but slight increase in proportion to population. In the older States, or perhaps one should say in those States where the movement early gained volume, the increase of late generally goes on at a slower rate. In the South it seems especially rapid, though not yet attaining the volume it has in the North and West. It is unfortunate that the Report was unable, from defects in the original material, to distinguish between divorces granted whites and blacks. But clearly the increase is chiefly among the blacks. It is difficult for various reasons to find a perfectly satisfactory basis for comparison. The ratio of divorces to the population, to the marriages formed during the year, to existing married couples, or to the marriages dissolved for all reasons in the year, all prove imperfect forms of statement. Some fail for want of the necessary data; others fort heir need of corrections not easily made. But it is evident that divorces have been so numerous in several States that they must in some years be one in ten or even nine of the marriages.1

The same thing goes on in Canada and Europe, though with a very different volume. Canada granted only four divorces in 1867 and eleven in 1886. European countries and states, including Canada, give results as follows for the years named, being those in which statistics for the earlier and later dates are supplied in the Appendix to the Report. Between 1867 to 1886, eleven foreign countries or states increased their

1 For a discussion of the various methods of computing ratios, see the ANDOVER REVIEW for January, 1887, in the article on the "Verification of Social Statistics."

divorces in the aggregate from 3,541 to 9,200. Between 1876 and 1886, thirteen give figures. These show an increase from 6,540 to 10,909, or sixty-seven per cent. The increase between these two years in the United States was 72.5 per cent. But here, of course, the increase of population must have been much greater. Like the South, the increase in Europe seems now more rapid, partly because the movement has not yet attained the volume of our own Northern and Western States. The exceptions to the movement in Europe are almost as few as in the United States. All the countries in Europe which gave us figures for 1885 report a total of 23,735. Probably the statistics of all Europe, if fully collected, would now give about the same number of divorces as the United States, though the latter has less than one fifth of the population of Europe. The highest divorce rate in Europe for an entire country is in Switzerland, which had one for every 20 marriages in 1882. The city of Hamburg is the worst single locality reported, with one to 16. The German Empire has about one in 60; but Saxony has had one to 30. The ratio in France reached in 1885 one in 45, being one to 46 the next year.

Here, then, we meet the great fact of a vast social movement, affecting peoples under all laws, religions, and races, and with exceptions such as prove the rule rather than otherwise. For it seems true, generally, that some special reason, like an exceptional condition of law, or the comparative isolation of a state or country from the great social currents of the times, is the leading cause of the exceptions.

2. The influence of legislation upon divorces in this country is almost the first object of attention. This matter is discussed in the Report, with several pages of comment on the changes of laws and their effect upon the increase of divorces. The relation of laws to the volume of the movement, that is, to the greater or less number of divorces in the several States, is not discussed in the analysis of the tables, though the Report has a good deal of material bearing upon the point. Upon the increase, the conclusion seems to be that the relaxations or restrictions of law do affect divorces most perceptibly, but not enough to account for more than a part of the increase. In the three of our States showing decided decrease in divorces, the improvement is due to more stringent legislation. Every one will regret that Vermont repealed her law of 1884 before it was fairly tried. This secured a delay of six months after the entering of libels for divorce, and required the presence of the defendant in court when it could be secured. It greatly reduced divorces. Five States, including Indiana and Vermont, now require the prosecuting attorney of the State to appear, either in all suits, or in certain classes of them. But no information is at hand showing the use made of this feature of law. In Europe a similar provision is perhaps the rule, and the practice seems to conform to its spirit as well as its letter. The various "omnibus clauses," that is, enactments by which large discretion was given to the courts, and which aided the parties who sought divorce for reasons hard to establish under strictly defined causes, have nearly disappeared from the statute books, and the result is everywhere good. Indiana repealed such a clause in 1873, and further provided that abandonment must last two years instead of one, and that "failure of the husband to make reasonable provision for his family must be "for the period of two years." This legislation checked the increase of divorces for five years. In the last ten years they have, however, increased sixty per cent.

Looking, now, from the increase of divorces to the influence of law upon their prevalence, there is evidently material for thought. Maine, since 1883, has several causes for divorce in place of one chief statutory cause, "omnibus clause" that covered most cases before that date. Yet her divorces since are hardly two thirds what they were for four years before that time. High divorce rates, as a rule, nowhere exist unless the causes are so many or so loosely stated that divorces can be granted readily. Administration of law greatly affects the results. For example, New York, with only one cause for absolute divorce, has forty per cent. more divorces than New Jersey with two, not counting those which are more properly grounds for nullity. This better condition of New Jersey is probably due to her system of courts of chancery, to which all libels of divorce are committed, and whose rules of procedure, I have been told, are carefully framed and faithfully applied. The notorious case of Sheriff Flach has led to the revision of the rules of the courts in New York, by which the common practice of putting cases into the hands of a referee outside the court is likely to be restricted. I believe Chicago some years ago gave up the practice of hearing cases in private; in chambers," as it is called. If I mistake not, it is no longer lawful in Illinois for the divorce lawyer to advertise his trade in the newspapers. This subject of administration under the rules of the courts does not come within the scope of the Report, but it is probable that a very marked improvement in respect to divorces granted would be effected by stricter administration of such laws as we now have.

3. The influence of conflicting laws upon divorce is a subject of great interest. There has been a strong public sentiment in favor of uniform marriage and divorce laws for the entire country, involving in the minds of most an amendment of the Constitution of the United States giving jurisdiction to Congress over all matters relating to marriage and divorce in the entire country. A few, however, have hoped for this result through some convention of the States. Several objects seem desirable. The first is to secure a common legal status throughout the country for the married and divorced, and for their children. It is well known that sometimes distressing conditions beset the innocent for lack of this uniformity. A second reason comes from the opportunities that now exist for deceit, fraud, and great wrong which individuals suffer, and which bring dishonor to the States by parties going from one State to another to obtain divorces more easily or more agreeably. It is possible for a man nominally to spend three months in Dakota, running into the State at regular intervals, if he does not care to spend the ninety days there, and come back with a divorce of which his innocent wife knows nothing. A winter's stay in California may be prolonged to six months with like results. Indeed, several States and Territories afford such facilities. A summer at Newport may be lengthened out to a year, with frequent visits to New York, and thus allow one to escape the necessity of establishing the one cause required in New York, or the resident of New York may contrive to comply with the law of the adjoining State of Pennsylvania, and reside there nominally or in reality for a year. Utah formerly permitted one filing a mere expression of a desire to become a resident to sue for divorce. Certain parties in certain States, in league with officers of the courts in Utah for two or three years did an enormous business for their clients. No less than 914 divorces for 1877 were discovered by the expert of the Department, nearly all of which