WOMEN: Debate

At 133 East 61st St., Manhattan, home of the New York Junior League, there was a debate. The judges were Ethel Barrymore, Alice Duer Miller and Frank Crowninshield, editor of Vanity Fair. The question was: Should a Woman Keep her Maiden Name after Marriage?

The two debaters were Mrs. Heywood Broun, who upheld the affirmative, and Mrs. J. Hartley Manners, who opposed her. Mrs Broun said: “When you are a girl of 21 or maybe 30 and get married, your past life flashes behind you as you are pronounced Mrs. So-and-So and you realize that you are ‘Miss’ no more. And this isn’t legal, for the law says that you can keep your born name if you want to.”

Mrs. Manners said: “I’m wondering just what we would do if we all demanded the right to keep our own names and the men said: ‘Why, yes! goahead and be a miss if you like.’ There’s no way then for him to make an honest woman of you.

“I asked Mary Pickford how she felt about it and she said, ‘You see, Laurette, I’m so little and our house is so big that I prefer to be called Mrs. Fairbanks at home. It makes me feel more important when I have to speak to the butler.”

The judges returned and delivered the following verdict: 1) that both the ladies were arguing for the affirmative; 2) that Mrs. Broun won; 3) that Mrs. Manners was the more persuasive.