Constitutional Whig

FOR THE WHIG.

To the Members of the Virginia Legislature, jointly and severally.

Gentlemen: Permit an individual, who feels an interest in the well-being and happiness of his native State, to approach you, and with that respect which he feels to be due, and which he is disposed to render to the guardians of the people's rights, to offer a suggestion to your consideration.

Burdened as you are, and have long been, with local matters--with matters which do not belong to the general interest of the State, it must be desirable with yourselves, as doubtless it is with the people, that you should be discharged from some part of this burden: and if it be found practicable, in part at least, to relieve yourselves and the State, may it not be presumed, that you will be disposed to adopt any reasonable and eligible measures, for the effecting of that object?

In the course of the various resolutions offered at an early period in the session of the Convention, two or three things, of the kind above mentioned, were pointed out by one of the members, (C. Johnson, Esq.) as not coming properly within the range of legislative operation. Among these was the granting of bills of divorce. Without presuming to judge, as a statesman, of the correctness of this tenet, I may be allowed to say, that I was forcibly struck with a sense of the expediency of placing this business in other hands than those of the Legislature. This consideration, if well founded, is itself sufficient to induce the adoption of such a course. Permit me to offer a few reflections on this point:

1. To place this matter in other hands, will lighten the burden of the Legislature and the expenses of the State.

2. The authority to dissolve marriages which are unlawful ab initio, is vested by law in the Circuit Courts of the State; and no good reason can be given, why the same tribunal should not be authorized to dissolve marriages, where existing circumstances shall appear to justify a divorce.

3. It will readily be conceived, that the state of the case where a divorce may be sued for, can be ascertained with more facility and more correctness, by the convenient location of the tribunal before which the decision is to take place.

With these considerations before you, and others which your own good judgment may suggest, it is submitted to you, gentlemen of the Legislature, whether it will not be an advisable step--whether it is not due to propriety, to pass a law which shall authorize the Circuit Courts to grant bills of divorce.

VERITAS.