The Bamberg Herald

Their Position Has Improved Some Cause for Complaint.

Although the legal status of women has been much improved in England, the law still favors the stronger sex at the expense of the weaker, says the Queen. Apart from the question of divorce there are other laws which are very unfair.

At one time the law did not recognize the wife as having any separate civic existence. She was under coverture that is to say, under the guardianship and control of her husband-and was not regarded as a free agent. The husband had absolute control over her person, her children (after the age of nurture,) her property and her earnings, so long as he did not ill treat her.

She could not dispose of any property or enter into any contract without his consent, and he could at any time revoke her will if he chose. The only way in which her property could be protected was by a marriage settlement, and such settlements were not usual except in the case of well to do women.

There was no way of securing the earnings of a poor woman from a spendthrift or tyrannical husband, and many cases of hardship occurred, cases in which a woman time after time made a little home for her children by her earnings and the husband came and sold everything to spend on drink.

To-day the wife who has separate property or who is capable of earning her own living is practically independent. She may dispose of her money and other belongings if she pleases and enter into any contract without obtaining her husband's permission. But if she has no source of income beyond that her husband allows her she is very much at the mercy of his whim. He is not bound to make her any allowance, either for her personal use or for housekeeping expenses, however hard she may toil for his benefit.

Not only can a husband keep his wife extremely short of money during his life, denying her comforts for which he can well afford to pay, but in the absence of a marriage settlement the wife has no security that any provision will be made for her after her husband's death, however wealthy he may be.

Unless there is freehold property, in which case she has a certain right to dower under an old act, a widow has no claim to any part of her husband's estate if he chooses to leave it all away from her, but she and her children may be left absolutely destitute.

Roman law recognized the inalienable right of a wife to a certain proportion of her husband's property after his death, and this right is enforced in Scotland and in almost every country of the civilized world, including those countries where the Mohammedan religion is practiced.

New Zealand at first followed the bad custom of the mother country of leaving the wife dependent on her husband's caprice, but since women obtained the vote the law has been altered so that a man can not leave all his property away from his wife nor a parent from his or her children.

In New Zealand, too, men and women are now equal with regard to the law of intestacy. Here if the wife dies without making a will her husband takes all her property, but if the husband dies intestate the wife in no case gets more than half the property and some times only a third. If a man has no near relatives, but only a widow, half goes to the crown. It certainly can not be said that English law favors the widow.