6.  To place on probation (together with either 4 or 5).

    7.  Commitment—­usually to jail or workhouse, and for a period of not
    over six months.  May be longer for violation of probation or for
    aggravated offense.

When the deserting man has gone without the borders of the state, there is the added problem of securing his extradition, which is often a difficult one.  Wife desertion is in most states only a misdemeanor (in New York it is even less serious and constitutes in the eye of the law only disorderly conduct).  Since extradition between states has to be acted upon by the governors of the states, it is unusual (though not impossible[30]) to secure extradition for a misdemeanor.  The reluctance of the authorities is understandable, however, when it is realized that to extradite for wife desertion would be to create a precedent for extradition for any sort of misdemeanor.  There is in most states a law which makes the abandonment of a minor child or children a felony, punishable by a long term in state prison, and it is this law which is generally invoked when the man has been traced to another state.  Complaint then has to be made to the district (or county) attorney, the matter taken before the grand jury and an indictment secured before extradition papers can be granted.  The man, if captured, must usually be tried in a higher court than the domestic relations court; if convicted he is likely to be more severely punished.  Extradition means expense to the state; it is usually difficult, moreover, to get an active interest taken in extraditing a family deserter who, to the legal eye, has committed an offense neither against the person nor against property, and cannot therefore be a serious offender!

If extradition for family desertion is difficult between states, with other countries it is impossible, as no treaties exist even with contiguous countries like Canada and Mexico.[31] By special arrangement with the Canadian authorities, states which touch the Canadian border can sometimes obtain the person of a deserter without actual extradition.  Information is submitted to the police of the Canadian town where the man is known to be, who thereupon arrest him as an “undesirable citizen” and arrange for his deportation.  The neighboring state is notified, and an officer with a warrant meets the Canadian officer and the prisoner at the boundary, arresting the latter as soon as he sets foot across the state line.

The testimony of social workers is, in the main, in favor of probation as against long prison sentence for men of this type.  “We have found a shortened penitentiary sentence, with release on probation, very successful in a number of instances.”  “Sometimes the probation has been more effective by its being a sort of double probation; that is, having the case pending in juvenile court as well as municipal or district court.  The fear of having his children permanently taken from him if he again fails to support