THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 5, 1910. "FREAK LEGISLATION" IN AMERICA.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9682, 5 January 1910, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 5, 1910. "FREAK LEGISLATION" IN AMERICA.

The freakishness of American Statelegislation, which Mr Bryce commented on long ago, was instanced the other day by the attempts made by one of these legislatures to regulate by statute the size of women's theatre hats, and by another to stimulate the birth-rate by giving a bonus of five dollars per child born. Its more noticeable effects are interestingly summarised in an article in the October "North American Review" by the late Mr Phillip Loring Allen, a political writer by whose death American political literature has lost a valuable contributor. "Freak bills" as he calls them, are said to he regular features of State sessions. Thus it has been proposed to legislatively put a tax on whiskers in New Jersey, and on bachelors in, Nebraska; in Minnesota an effort has been made to declare it a criminal offence for a farmer not to rotate his crops, in lowa to ordain that every egg shall be stamped with the date on which it is laid, and in Missouri to so rigorously put down "treating," that the swain who bought his inamorata ice cream or pink lemonade would be punishable. The motorist is "naturally a primeobjective for this sort of legislation, which chivvies him about and worries him with different road regulations every time he darts across a border. Limiting speed is the method of control generally in use, but each legislature is fancyfree in regard to what is fair speed, with the result that the "automobolist" is safe, up to thirty miles an hour in New Jesery, while in Alabama he may not do more than eight. More seriously, in Indiana a third conviction for felony means imprisonment for life, and in New York all sentences to gaol are indeterminate—a questionably salutary exercise of a good principle, one would think, in a country where so much is possible to anyone with a "pull," and the whole penal system, from the judge down to the warder, is permeated with politics. As for

divorce, in which the dissimilarity of the ilaws is as scandalous as it is remarkable, in some States only six months' residence qualifies for the Court, in others as long as five years is required. "Gross neglect of duty." "cruelty or indignities," "intent to become a citizen of another country," "neglect" or desertion for one year, and the wife's objection to live in a particular State, are among the recognised grounds. According to another recent American writer, the little city of Reno in Nevada, is the popular divorce resort at present. Obtaining a decree on short residence is so easy there that people are flocking to the place from all over the Union, and in some cases earning their living while they qualify, so that the waitress at the hotel and the conductor on the tram are sometimes found to be putting in the residence condition. Efforts have been made at various times to bring about uniformity of legislation, especially in regard to divorce, but with ho material result so far; and, as would be expected, advocates of centralised legislative control have made the most of State whimsicalnese. Excepting divorce, however — which is properly a matter for national regulation, and sHould not have been left to the States—the, questions which Spates make Comedy of are not such as Congress could deal with. They are of local significance, and should be dealt with by the States in accordance with that sensibly tendency to remit more and more domestic authority to local governing bodies which finds 1 strikiHg,exemplification in the powers of the English County, Councils. # And even where the subject is large there is no confident presumption that the national Legislature, would control it with strength or wisdom. On the contrary, the failure of Congress to regulate the trusts, and the notorious entrenchment within it of privileged interests, are anything but reassuring in that respect. As a matter of fact, it is declared that the States have led every successful movement for the equalisation of transportation rates,, and have effected many reductions, while none have been brought about by the Federal authorities. A .country of America's size geographically cannot be governed from the centre in all or even most things, and centralisation is not likely to be favoured there. The eccentricity of some State Legislatures indeed, shows the impossibility of anything like unification by indicating local differences and independences not amenable to central bureaucratic control. As Mr Allen wrote, "no far-reaching national policy, but only the simplest mechanism of friendly co-operation, is needed to eliminate many of the needless and annoying differences in State policy." And an approach is being gradually made to this by the study of comparative legislation and the efforts of States to make themselves familiar with the character and eifect of, their neighbours' laws. Thus, while the legislator who burns to abolish the matinee hat will always be likely to arise in his reforming wrath, the tendency of the States will be to assimilate law in important things of general concern.