Marriage+Laws

= Marriage Laws of the Late 1800's =



In the late 1800's, when this play was created and took place, the [|marriage laws]were much different than the laws we know now. Men had a lot of the power and they owned everything. A woman would be owned by her father until he gave her away on her wedding day. As soon as a woman married, all of her wealth and any income she has would go directly to her husband. For a long time women could not even divorce their husbands if they were being unfaithful. In 1857, women were given the right to divorce their husbands but the children would be the men's property and if he chose, a mother may have never been able to see her children again. Men had all of the say in the marriage and all the women could do was sit back and watch their lives go by. There was hardly anything they could do about it.