With respect to the ban on marriages, I have [ . . . ] noticed that my work regulations give just as little mention to a ban on marriage as to one on litigation and complaints. The only requirement is: The employee shall give notice of his or her intentions, so that I am in a position – when I deem it necessary – to avert unnecessary complaints or prevent foolish marriages. It should be understood that in some cases I will go as far to say: [ . . . ] I consider this marriage completely irresponsible. This will apply, for example, if someone 18 or 19 years old, who is sickly and not even fully grown, who has a small income and no savings, wants to marry a girl who has not saved anything either, so that surely an unhappy union, in which the children cannot not be fed, is to be expected. Of course, in such cases I will say: If you don’t follow my advice, I will terminate employment, obviously with notice. [ . . . ] If semi-mature youths, who are not yet earning an adequate income, enter marriage prematurely and produce children, they will not be able to feed and raise them and they will lose the necessary energy and zest to carry out their work.
The necessary correlate to such regulations is also obvious: If employees have entered a marriage and are unable to feed their children through no fault of their own, then I feel responsible on my part to support them – in other words, to draw the necessary conclusions from my system and say: If you meet my requirements and follow my advice, I will, accordingly, stand by you. One thing is connected to the other. If, on the other hand, I were to allow my workers to enter into marriages in the most careless manner, to ruin themselves downright, then no one could demand that I stand by them; otherwise I would be rewarding imprudence, and I am not willing to do that, for I would not see myself as fulfilling a moral duty in this way.
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