SECOND WIFE COMES FIRST.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 17 July 1924, Page 5

SECOND WIFE COMES FIRST.

A QUESTION OF MAINTENANCE. DIVORCED MAN’S BURDEN EASED (BV TELEGRAPH —PRESS ASSOCIATION. 1 _ CHRISTCHURCH, July 15. Vr ln Magistrate’s Court to-day, Mr IVyvern Wilson, S.M., eased the burden of a divorced and second time married man by cancelling the maintenance order held against him by bis first wife. 'William Henry Harris, car. Hastings, applied for the cancellation of a maintenance order in respect of Helen Harris to the amount of LI 5s a week. Mr. A. C. Brassington appeared for complainant, and Mr 4. Brown appeared for the first wife and objected to the cancellation Mr. Brassington said that the ease w&s one which arose out of the new divorce laws. The divorce wa s obtained alter a mutual separation, and the case was of a class which would come before the court frequently. The husband had married a second time, and it he had to maintain his first wife second wife would have to go short, the first wife was earning £4 a week an J bonus as forewoman at a factory. . Mr Brown said the defendant, went into hi s new responsibilities with his eyes open. He was earning £5 a week. S* nce the divorce the circumstances had changed and had made the action permissible. Complainant was convinced that having married again he should be relieved of all responsibilities for the wife from whom he was divorced He thought that the order should certainly be reduced, but not that it should be cancelled. The Magistrate said that the case was of some importance as an instance of a class which was likely to come before . the courts fairly freely since the amendment in the divorce laws. The first wife had an order against the husband for 25s a week, and then it had been arranged to get a- divorce by consent, one of the new forms of divorce founded upon a separation for three years. The husband had now contracted another mariiijage, as he was perfectly free to do, and he was legally responsible for the fnaintenance of his present wife. At the time of the divorce and at the present time the divorced wife was quite able to maintain herself. The ages of the parties did not appear in evidence, hut he presumed that neither of them was advanced in years. It seemed to him that since the making of the maintenance order the circumstances had §o changed that the matter should be readjusted. Complainant was trying to maintain a wife with an income probably about the same as the divorced wife had. He thought the complainant’s first duty was to his second wife, and it seemed to be neither light nor fair that he should have to contribute to the maintenance of his divorced wife. It was a divorce by consent, without a fault on either side, and the parties were apparently with equal means. He would make an order for cancellation of the maintenance order and would treat the parties equally by ordering each to pay costs.