Leidsch Dagblad
- The Causes of the Stench of the Leiden Canals
- Association of Women Citizens
- Civil Register of Leiden
The Leiden daily's page of 27 October 1926 carried a report on research into why the city's canals stank: Miss Korswagen, after examining a large number of water samples, concluded among other things that the chlorine content of Leiden's canal water never rose high enough to affect the stench at all. A report from the Association of Women Citizens (Vereeniging van Staatsburgeressen) gave a speaker's account of Dutch marriage law since 1838, arguing that the Civil Code had stripped out the better elements of the French law and placed all power with the husband through his 'marital power'. The page also printed the municipal civil register, opening with the births of Leiden children.
Translation
THE CAUSES OF THE STENCH OF THE LEIDEN CANALS.
On the basis of investigations of a large number of samples, Miss Korswagen arrived at the result summarized in the following conclusions: 1. The chlorine content of the canal water in Leiden never reaches a concentration that could influence the formation of the stench in even the slightest degree.
ASSOCIATION OF WOMEN CITIZENS.
The speaker now dealt with marriage legislation, its origin and operation. The marriage legislation under which we now live dates in fact from 1838. Before that there was no statutory regulation; during the French domination a law was derived from the Code Napoléon (the French legislation). In 1838 our Civil Code was made, and marriage legislation was also regulated in it. From this regulation the good that was still to be found in the French legislation was removed again. At that time all power was placed in the hands of the strong man; nothing was laid on the weak shoulders of the woman. The man had, as it was called, the marital power.
Civil Register of Leiden.
BORN. Wilhelmina, d. of P. Otgaar and C. Bouwman. – Frans Johan Willem, s. of A. Bouwman and F. L. Roetman. – Helena Jacoba, d. of K. Kalkhoven and J. M. C. Verhoeven.
Context
Leiden's centuries-old canal pollution
The stench the article investigates was an old problem by 1926. Leiden's canals had been polluted by the discharge of industrial and household waste water for centuries. As early as about 1400 the city government issued rules to limit the pollution, but they achieved little. In later centuries the city flushed its canals, yet rotting sludge kept causing heavy stench nuisance. After 1866, the year a cholera epidemic broke out, most of Leiden's canals were filled in. In the paper's account, Miss Korswagen sampled the water of the canals that were still open, and her first conclusion ruled out chlorine as a cause of the stench.
Sewerage plans under way when the article appeared
Leiden moved to a separate sewer system only in the twentieth century, often combined with filling in the stinking canals. A Hague engineering firm had made recommendations in 1922, and on 1 October 1925, about a year before this article, the city hired the engineer J.E. de Meyier to work them out. Two years after the article, with the Northern Sewage Pumping Station on the Maresingel, built in 1928, untreated sewage was actively pumped out of the city into the Slaagsloot. Leiden's first sewage treatment plant went into operation only in 1939. The paper's report on the causes of the stench thus appeared while the city was preparing these works.
A suffrage society turned association of citizenesses
The Vereeniging van Staatsburgeressen was the renamed Vereeniging voor Vrouwenkiesrecht, the main women's suffrage movement in the Netherlands. After women's suffrage was achieved in 1919, the association took its new name and kept striving for women's independence, although it still considered the woman's role within the family important. A lecture on marriage law fits that programme, because marriage law defined the legal position of the married woman. In 1930 the association merged with the Nederlandsche Unie voor Vrouwenbelangen. The meeting reported on this page therefore took place after women had won the vote and before that merger.
How the married woman's legal incapacity lasted until 1957
The account that the 1838 Civil Code removed the good elements of French law and gave the husband 'marital power' is the speaker's argument as the paper reports it. Independent sources document how long the married woman's subordinate position lasted. The law of 14 June 1956 (Staatsblad 1956, 343) abolished the legal incapacity of the married woman and took effect on 1 January 1957; it is named after its intellectual author, Julius Christiaan van Oven. Its history was long and uneven: bills were introduced, left on the shelf and withdrawn, and Article 160(1) of the old Civil Code, 'The husband is the head of the marital union', was struck out and then retained again. Van Oven held to his view for almost thirty years against the current. The husband's power that the speaker criticized in 1926 thus remained in law for three more decades.
Original
DE OORZAKEN VAN DE STANK DER LEIDSCHE GRACHTEN.
Aan de hand van onderzoekingen van een groot aantal monsters kwam mej. Korswagen tot het resultaat, samengevat in de volgende conclusies: 1. Het chloorgehalte van het grachtwater te Leiden bereikt nooit een concentratie, die de stankvorming ook maar in de geringste mate kan beïnvloeden.
VEREEN. VAN STAATSBURGERESSEN.
Spr. behandelde nu de huwelijkswetgeving in haar ontstaan en werking. De huwelijkswetgeving waaronder wij thans leven, dagteekent feitelijk van 1838. Vooraf was er geen wettelijke regeling; tijdens de Fransche overheersching werd een wet ontleend aan de code Napoleon (de Fransche wetgeving). In 1838 werd ons Burgerlijk Wetboek gemaakt en daarin werd ook de huwelijkswetgeving geregeld. Uit deze regeling werd het goede, dat in de Fransche wetgeving nog werd aangetroffen, weder verwijderd. Toen werd alle macht in handen gelegd van den sterken man, op de zwakke schouders der vrouw werd niets gelegd. De man had, zooals het heette, de maritale macht.
Burgerlijke Stand v. Leiden.
GEBOREN. Wilhelmina, d. v. P. Otgaar en C. Bouwman. - Frans Johan Willem, z. v. A. Bouwman en F. L. Roetman. - Helena Jacoba, d. v. K. Kalkhoven en J. M. C. Verhoeven.
Source: Source: Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken (leiden.courant.nu)