in full those of property alone would require as much space as could be granted in the History for the entire chapter. It is not possible to make in these introductory paragraphs an adequate digest of these laws in various States. They are not precisely the same in any two of the forty-nine States and Territories, and they offer a striking illustration of the attempts of law-makers, during the last few decades, to rectify in a measure the legal outrages of the past, and of their inability in the present state of their development to grant absolute justice. That must await the lawmakers of the future, and probably the time when women shall have a part in selecting them.
All that can be claimed for the statutes quoted herein is that they are as nearly correct as it has been possible to make them. With but one or two exceptions, the Attorney-Generals in every State have been most courteous and obliging when appealed to for assistance. The laws for women, however, have been so taken from and added to, so torn to pieces and patched up, that the best lawyers in many States say frankly that they do not know just what they are at the present time. Legislatures and code revision committees are continually tinkering at them and every year witnesses some changes in most of the States.[1] A very thorough abstract of the laws, made in 1886 by Miss Lelia J. Robinson, LL. B., a member of the bar in Massachusetts, was of almost no use in the compilation for this volume because of the endless alterations since that time. The Legal Status of Women, a condensed resume issued in 1897 by the National Suffrage Association, has been covered thickly with pencil marks during the preparation of this summary, as the reports received from different States have shown the changes effected in the few years which have since elapsed. A new book, Woman and the Law, prepared by a lecturer on political science in one of our largest universities and published in 1901, was hailed with joy, but was found to include a number of laws which had been repealed within the past four or five years and to omit some very important ones.
- ↑ Notwithstanding these efforts, the very statutes which are intended to be fair to women are continually found to be defective, and whenever any doubt arises as to their construction the Common Law must prevail, which in all cases is unjust to women. An example of this kind will be found in the chapter on New York, showing that it was held in 1901 that a wife's wages belonged to her husband, although it was supposed that these bad been secured to her beyond all question by a special statute of 1860.
