Alimony Racket: Ohio Alimony Association & “The War on Gold Diggers” - 1932

FULL TEXT: Cleveland, May 12. – The  year of moratoriums finds Olaf P. Knudsen engaged in agitating one on alimonies.

The president of the Ohio Alimony association is energetically mapping out a campaign against gold-diggers who marry and then divorce for a good cut of their husbands’ salaries.

“Today,” Knudsen declares wrathfully, “the courts are choked with cases of this type. Many never come to trial. Why need they? The greedy, self-entered woman who is suing her husband and her lawyer can usually gain their object – money – without trial.”

~ War on Gold Diggers ~

Knudsen himself is divorced. Not only does his organization intend to make it harder for the gold-digging type of wives to wrest money from their husbands, but also to remove the stigma of “criminal” from the names of those who go to jail when they default in alimony payments. It also aims to improve prison conditions for such prisoners. He finds no fault with awarding alimony to wives, who are physically incapacitated or who have children.

But to those who seek financial redrew either in spite, or to assure an easy living. Knudsen is derisive.

“We know that the present day system of granting alimony is all wrong,” he maintains. “Equality and Justice, rather than special privileges to women, ought to predominate.”

~ Planned Reforms ~

The Ohio Alimony association, Knudsen says, will strive to bring about the following reforms:

• Elimination of temporary alimony until the court has made a thorough investigation.

• Moratorium on alimony while the ex-husband is in jail for non-payment. Early hearings where temporary alimony is granted.

• No temporary alimony for childless women under 35 who are able to work.

• No alimony to childless women who remarry.

• Better jail conditions for alimony “martyrs.”

• Revision of the law and of court custom to change the face that a woman can take revenge on a former husband.

[“Moratorium For Alimony Is Urged - Head of Ohio Society Seeks Reforms for Ex-Hubbies,” syndicated (UP), May 13, 1932, p. 5]

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For more revelations of this suppressed history, see The Alimony Racket: Checklist of Posts

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