On the initiative of Roberta Nickolson, a member of the Indiana State Legislature, that state body took up the question of the "heart balm business", which has assumed threatening proportions and weird forms during the last few years in America.

This particular "business" is conducted as follows: A typical American gold digger, either an unmarried girl or a divorcee, becomes acquainted with a man. As soon as she finds out that the man is well to do, or a rich man, she files a suit charging the man with breach of promise or with some other "crime." Married gold diggers very often sue other women, charging them with alienation of affections or sue husbands for disruption of family life. The financial claims involved in such cases as a rule are very considerable indeed, sometimes reaching the sum of half a million dollars. As soon as these gold diggers receive their monetary recompense for their "broken hearts" or "disrupted 2family life" they retire from the "business" for some time and later on renew the search for new victims.

Such, briefly, is the technique employed in the "heart balm business", against which the fight is being waged on a large scale. American legislators and judges long since have established the fact that in many cases of this kind gold diggers victimize honest and respectable citizens. Often it even happens that claims are filed against a man the gold digger never saw, but merely knows his name and financial circumstances. For that reason all such suits, are to be regarded as mere attempts to defraud the victim.

In her fight against this evil, Mrs. Nickolson appeared before the legislators with complete exposures of this fraudulent business, and introduced a bill forbidding filing of such claims against men. The legislators adopted the measure without much discussion and Governor Mc Nutt signed it on March 11.

A few days later, a similar measure was passed by the New York State Legislature. At present similar bills are being discussed in Maryland, Illinois, Texas and other states. There is not the slightest doubt but that these bills 3will be passed by the legislators, for in most states the bills are introduced by women legislators, and not by men. The legislators reason that if women themselves introduce bills legislating against this kind of "business," which is engaged in mostly by women, they should not be rejected, for women know feminine affairs better than men do.

As a result of all this, the criminal activity of professional gold diggers, in two states has been stopped altogether, and the other states are expected to follow suit.

In some state legislatures the question of forbidding payment of alimony to childless divorcees is being discussed, for there are many gold diggers who marry men with a deliberate aim of divorcing them in a few months or even weeks, with the expectation of receiving alimony, the size of which depends on the financial circumstances of the victim selected.

This "gold digging business" must stop! It is a fraud and nothing else.