ROGER PRYOR

Marriage has always been a subject of regulation by the State. Is marriage ever looked upon as only a private contract between the man and the woman, to be made whenever they alone think fit, to last only during the term they may agree upon, and to end at their own will? Is the State no party to such a contract? Has the State no voice in consenting that it shall be made, in regulating its conditions after it is made, and in determining when and how it may be dissolved? Away, then with this argument of the free-love school!

Marriage has always been a subject of regulation by the State. Is marriage ever looked upon as only a private contract between the man and the woman, to be made whenever they alone think fit, to last only during the term they may agree upon, and to end at their own will? Is the State no party to such a contract? Has the State no voice in consenting that it shall be made, in regulating its conditions after it is made, and in determining when and how it may be dissolved? Away, then with this argument of the free-love school!