1
10
1
-
https://d1y502jg6fpugt.cloudfront.net/25778/archive/files/7a9baa2aa9e7c07e6a32dda13ed6cc29.pdf?Expires=1712793600&Signature=rjuHLgu2IYSJZVeRzekibHy2l2LBu%7EjQ4zd3cehJMG1OMSbEzraRJRlO3O5xaIHZ9%7Ev9lNEbm-0mLV9y70crVMpuDp5riznTdX%7EukpavfVF8ESOR5kp0nQ-rxg9kb2lpVvk9X3xx1T7d%7EMkF4A3rt35bjwl2cEMmrCtzNKTAGNeaQ3KCZ6GBOi7dcN0uZaYcxGOP-lnOtsczQEoiRGm4QkM7AoEdSGCXCcQrEXSpIXk%7EDP-qDyci1Kaj4NDj2V5KBb6Sp1shEyyjjjcGNGTHVZ42upViuO41yPFeTp9aw32kn-dzPPM6QzXrrTibxL1BRMlgMcIPvhTPso72r4wUQw__&Key-Pair-Id=K6UGZS9ZTDSZM
76df4cb2ecff70614305efd9b61e5212
PDF Text
Text
oé’?
NATIONAL SECULAR SOCIETY
THE LEGALISATION
OF
FEMALE SLAVERY IN ENGLAND.
By
ANNIE
BESANT.
[Reprinted from the National Reformer, June 4, 1876,j
The first annual meeting of the “British, Continental, and General
Federation for the Abolition of Government Regulation of Prostitu
tion ” was lately held at the Westminster Palace Hotel, and was
largely attended by friends of the movement from all parts of Eng
land, from France, and from Switzerland. M. Loyson, better known
as Father Hyacinthe, was to have been present, but a severe attack
of bronchitis chained him to his room ; M. de Pressensé, another
well-known French speaker, was, however, there to take his place,
together with M. Aimé Humbert, a gentleman whose talent appears
to lie in organisation and in work more than in speech. The longsustained labor of the Society for the Repeal of the Contagious
Diseases Acts is well-known to our readers ; many of them may not,
however, be aware of the late extension of the sphere of them work,
consequent on the thought and toil of their noble-hearted missionary,
Mrs. Josephine E. Butler. The narrative of her crusade through
Europe in the bitter cold, through France, into Italy, into Switzer
land, over the Jura in the depth of winter, now lies before us, and is
the record of a heroism equalled by few women, or by few men either.
(The title of the book is “The New Abolitionists”, price half-acrown, and it well deserves careful perusal, ) Undaunted by failure,
unwearied by defeat, loyal in spite of taunts, brave in spite of threats,
gallant-hearted in face of a misery and an evil which might well
drive the boldest to despair, Mrs. Butler sets us all an example by
which we should strive to profit. Societies have been formed in all
�2
THE LEGALISATION OF FEMALE SLAVERY IN ENGLAND.
directions in France, Switzerland, and Italy, and these are now feder
ated together into one body, sworn to destroy the recognition and
encouragement of prostitution by the State.
Reaction from Christian cant upon this subject, and the rightful
recognition of the sacredness and dignity of human nature, physical
as well as mental,. have to a great extent prejudiced many of the
Secular party against the society agitating for repeal; the unwise
and indelicate proceeding of scattering wholesale—so that they fell
into the hands of the youth of both sexes—a number of tracts and
leaflets dealing with medical details and with terrible crime«, the
perusal of which by young girls and boys is about as wholesome as
the reading of the Police News, roused a feeling of bitter indignation
against those whose names appeared as leaders of the repeal move
ment, although they were very likely utterly ignorant of the follies
perpetrated by unwise coadjutors. This phase fortunately seems to
have disappeared ; and it is hardly necessary to say that there is
nothing in the^speeches made at the meetings of the society to which
the most prudish could object, unless, indeed, they object to the
question being dealt with at all. Should this position be taken,
surely it is then well to remind such that the discussions to which
they object only become necessary through the existence of the evil
attacked, and that the lack of modesty lies in the commission of the
evil, and not in the endeavor to rescue the victims of it. When men
of the world angrily object to women touching such a subject, they
should remember that if they really respected the modesty and purity
of women no such subject would be in existence, and that to tho&e
who gain nothing by the perpetuation of prostitution their loud in
dignation looks very much like the angry dread of a slave -owner who
fears that the abolitionist preacher may possibly, sooner or later,
deprive him of the services of his human property. I assert that the
Secular party, as a whole, has a duty with regard to this subject,
which it somewhat fails to discharge; a duty towards the promotion
of national morality, of national health; and a duty also of asserting
the sacredness of the individual liberty of women as well as of men,
the inalienable rights of each over his or her own person.
It is perfectly true that marriage is different as regarded from the
Secularist and from the Christian point of view. The Secularist
reverences marriage, but he regards marriage as something far higher
thana union “blessed” by a minister ; he considers, also, that marriage
should be terminable, like any other contract, when it fails in its
object, and becomes injurious instead of beneficial; he does not
despise human passion, or pretend that he has no body; on the con
trary, reverencing nature,, he regards physical union as perfecting
the union of heart and mind, and sees in the complete unity of
marriage the possibility of a far higher and nobler humanity than
either man or woman can attain in a state of celibacy. But, surely,
in proportion to our admiration for this true marriage, and our
reverence for the home which it builds up, and which form s the
healthy and pure nursery for the next generation of citizens, must
be our pain and our regret when we come face to face with prosti-
�THE LEGALISATION OF FEMALE SLAVEKY IN ENGLAND.
3
tution, .By prostitution I mean simply and solely physical union
sold by one sex and bought by the other, with no love, no respect,
no reverence on either side. Of this, physical degradation and mental
degradation are the invariable accompaniments: just as intoxication
may be sometimes indulged in without leaving perceptible and per
manent bad effects, but, persisted in, destroys body and brain, so
may ®exual irregularity be practised for a time with little apparent
injury, but, persisted in, destroys as fatally as intoxication. This is
no matter of theory, it is simply a matter of observation ; individuals
whose lives are irregular, nations where prostitution is widespread,
lose stamina, virility, physical development, the whole type becoming
degraded. It is urged that “ man’s physical wants must be satisfied,
and therefore prostitution is a necessity”. Why therefore ? It might
as well be argued, man's hunger must be appeased, and therefore
theft of food is a necessity. The two things have no necessary con
nexion with each other. Does prostitution promote the national
health ? If so, why this necessity for legislation to check the spread
of contagious diseases ? Those diseases spring from sexual irregu
larities, and are an outraged Nature’s protest against the assertion
that prostitution is the right method of providing for the sexual
necessities of man. As surely as typhoid results from filth and
neglect, so does the scourge of syphilis follow in the wake of prosti
tution. These unfortunate women who are offered up as victims of
man’s pleasure, these poor white slaves sold for man’s use, these
become their own avengers, repaying the degradation inflicted on
them, and spreading ruin and disease among thore for whose wants
they exist as a class. Mrs. Butler truly writes : “You can under
stand how the men who have riveted the slavery of women for such
degrading ends become, in a generation or two, themselves the greater
slaves; not only the slaves of their own enfeebled and corrupted
natures, but of the women whom they have maddened, hardened, and
stamped under foot. Bowing down before the unrestrained dictates
of their own lusts, they now bow down also before the tortured and
fiendish womanhood which they have created. . . . They plot and
plan in vain for their own physical safety. Possessed at times with
a sort of stampede of terror, they rush to International Congresses,
aad forge together more chains for the dreaded wild beast they have
SO carefully trained, and in their pitiful panic build up fresh barri
cades between themselves and that womanhood which they proclaim
to be a ‘permanent source of sanitary danger’.” Mrs. Butler was
writing from Paris, where the system is carried out which we have in
England in only a few towns. If any one doubts the reality of this
natural retribution, let him go and watch the streets where many of
these poor ruined creatures may be found, and there see what women
are when transformed into prostitutes—a source of disease instead of
health, of vice instead of purity. Each one might have been the
centre of a happy home, the mother of brave men and women who
would have served the Fatherland, and we have made them this.
National morality and national health go hand-in-hand; a vicious
nation will be a weak nation, and when a government begins to deli
�4
THE LEGALISATION OF FEMALE SLAVERY IN ENGLAND.
berately license women for the purposes of prostitution, it has taken
the first step towards the ruin of the nation it administers. Louis
Napoleon made Paris a sink of impurity; when the struggle came,
the working-classes only—whose circumstances preserved them from
gross excesses—-were fit to fight for France. When the license system
has had a fair trial, and the danger spreads and spreads, the govern
ment finds itself burdened with a class of women it has formed and
certificated; and despairing of repressing disease by simple licensing,
it begins to gather the women into houses, licensed also by itself;
abroad, in England’s colonies, these houses are licensed by England’s
riders, and in France, in Italy, and elsewhere, they are found in most
cities. Thus government becomes saddled with the supervision of a
vast and organised system of prostitution, and struggles vainly against
the evils resulting from it. In Italy, the government draws money
from this source, and the shame of Italy’s daughters and the profli
gacy of her sons are made a source of national revenue. And what
is the result ? simply that these houses become foci of vice,
demoralising the youth of the country. “Pastor Borel testified to
having seen schoolboys entering these haunts of patented vice, with
their satchels on their backs.” Well might we ask, with the old Roman
Consul, Postumius : “ Can ye think that such youths are fit to be mad@
soldiers ? That wretches brought out of the temple of obscenity
could be trusted with arms ? That those contaminated with such
debaucheries could be the champions for the chastity of the wives
and children of the Roman people ? ” Profligates can never be made
into sturdy citizens ; muscles enervated by the embraces of purchased
women will never be strung to heroism ; a vicious nation will never
be a nation of freemen. Then, in the name of the liberty we have
won, of the glory of England, in the hope of the coming Republic,
we are surely bound to protest against the introduction of a system
among us that has degraded every nation in which it has been tried,
which has only got, as yet, one foot upon our shores, and which, if
we were true to our duty, we might easily drive from our English
soil before it has time to sap the strength of our men and to destroy
the honor of our name.
It still remains to see how this legislation is consonant with indi
vidual liberty; how it is touched by the question of a standing army ;
fond how the evil of prostitution may be met and overcome.
I have already urged that no repressive Acts wall destroy disease
in a community where prostitution is encouraged, and that the wide
prevalence of prostitution is ruinous to the physique of a nation; the
admitted failure of regulation abroad, and the more and more com
plete control demanded for the police over the unfortunate worn®
sacrificed to the “necessities of men”, prove, beyond the possibility
of denial, that no eradication of disease is to be hoped for unless the
registered women be given over thoroughly to continual supervision,
and be literally made slaves, equally obedient to the call of the doctor
who heals and to that of the man who infects, holding their bodies at
the hourly order of each class, with no rightv of self-possession, no
power of self-rule permitted to them. I challenge this claim, made in
�THE LEGALISATION OF FEMALE SLAVERY IN ENGLAND.
O
the name of the State, over one class of its citizens, and I assert that
the sacred right of individual liberty is grossly and shamefully out
raged by this interference of government, and that, therefore, every
soldier of liberty is bound to rise in protest against the insult offered
to her. No more inalienable right exists than the right of the indi
vidual to the custody of his own person; in a free country none can
be deprived of this right save by a sentence given in open court, after
a jury of his peers has found him guilty of a crime which, by the laws
under which he lives, is punished by restriction of that liberty; so
jealously is this right guarded, however, even in the criminal whose
full exercise of it is temporarily suspended, that the limits within
which it may be touched are carefully drawn ; even in the prison-cell
th© felon has not lost all right over himself, and his personal liberty
is only restricted on the points where the law has suspended it. No
official may dare to compel a criminal to labor, for instance, unless
compulsion to labor is part of the judicial sentence. Firm and strong
lies the foundation stone of liberty. No citizen’s personal liberty may
be interfered with, unless proof of guilt justifying that interference be
tendered in open court, and every citizen has a right to demand that open
trial if he be arrested by any officer of the law. This is the foundation
Stone which is rudely upset by the Contagious Diseases Acts. Under
them women are arrested, condemned, and sentenced to a terrible
punishment, without any open accusation or public trial; by simple
brute force they are compelled to submit, despite their pleading, their
ene®, their struggles; they have no redress, no assistance ; they are
degraded both in their own sight and in the sight of all who deal with
them; a free woman is deprived by force of the custody of her own
body, and all human right is outraged in her person —and for what ?
in order that men may more safely degrade her in the future, and may
use her for their own amusement with less danger to themselves. A
number of citizens are deprived of their natural rights in order that
other citizens may profit by their loss ; and the State, the incarnation
of justice, the protector of the rights of all, dares thus to sacrifice the
rights of some of its members to the pleasure of others. It is idle to
urge that these women are too degraded to have any rights; the argu
ment is too dangerous for men to use; for if the women are too
degraded, the men who make and keep them what they are are partners
of their degradation; if the women are brutalised, only brutalised
men can take pleasure in their society; every harsh word cast at these
poor victims recoils with trebled force on the head of those who not
only seek their companionship, but actually pay for the privilege of
consorting with them.
But not only is liberty outraged by this intrusion on individual selfpossession, but it is still further trampled under foot by the injustice
perpetrated. Two citizens commit a certain act; the law punishes
one by seizure, imprisonment, disgrace ; it leaves the other perfectly
fre®. No registration of women would be necessary if the other sex
left women to themselves; no disease could be spread except by the
CO-operation of men. By what sort of justice, then, does the law
Seize one only of two participators in a given action ? If it be pleaded
�6
THE LEGALISATION OF FEMALE SLAVERY IN ENGLAND.
that individual liberty may be overborne by social necessities-an
argument which does not really admit of being used in this matter—
en the good of society” demands the arrest, imprisonment, and
examination of both parties ; it can serve no useful purpose to allow
unhealthy men to propagate disease among healthy women. If men
have the right to demand the protection of the law, why should
women be deprived of that same protection ? If so necessary for the
safety of men, why not necessary for the safety of women ? Is it not,
really, far more needed among the men, for, if a married man should
contract disease, he may infect his innocent wife and his unborn
children f Surely the State should interfere for the protection of
these , and any man found in a house of ill-fame, or consorting with
a prostitute, should be at once arrested, be compelled to prove that
he is not married, and has no intention of being so ; and, failing such
proof, should be examined, and kept in hospital, if need be, until
perfectly cured. The Acts would be very rapidly repealed in St.
Stephen, s if all their provisions were carried out justly, on both sexes
alike.
Men would not submit to it.” Of course they would not,
if one gleam of manhood remained in them; and neither would women,
with any sense of womanhood, submit to it, if they were not bound
hand and foot by the triple cord of ignorance, weakness, and starva
tion. Poor, pitiful sufferers, trampled on by all, till the sweet flower
of womanhood is crushed out for evermore, and only some faint breath
of. its natural fragrance now and then arises to show how sweet it
might have been if left to grow unbruised. In the name, then, of
Liberty outraged, in the name of Equality disregarded, we claim the
lepeal of these one-sided Acts, even if the bond of Fraternity prove
too weak to hold men back from this cruelty inflicted on their sisters.
But, it is urged, with a celibate standing army, prostitution is a
physical necessity. Then, if an institution lead to disease, deteriora
tion of physique, and moral and mental injury, destroy the institution
which breeds these miseries, instead of trying to kill its offspring one
by one. .A large standing army is unnecessary; the enforcement of
celibacy is a crime. Of course, if a number of young and healthy
men are taken away from home, kept in idleness, and deprived of all
female society, immorality must necessarily result from such an un
natural state of things. The enforcement of celibacy on vigorous men
always results in libertinage, whether among celibate priests or celi*
bate soldiers. But the natural desires of these men are not rightfully
met by the State supplying them with a number of licensed women;
to do that is to treat them simply like brutes, and thereby to degrade
them; it is to teach them that there is nothing holy in love, nothing
sacred in womanhood; it is to change the sacrament of humanity into
an orgie, and to pollute the consecration of the future home with the
remembrance of a parody of love. With a celibate standing army
prostitution is a necessity, and I know of no reason why we should
look at facts as we should like them to be, instead of facts as they
are ; but a celibate standing army is not a necessity. The true safe
guard of a free nation is not a large standing army; rather is it a
well-organised militia, regularly drilled and trained, whose home
�THE LEGALISATION OF FEMALE SLAVERY IN ENGLAND.
7
ties and home-interests will, in ease of honorable war, nerve each arm
with double strength, and string each muscle with the remembrance
of the home that is threatened by the foe. The hero-armies of history
are not the armies which idle in peace, and have nought in common
with the citizens ; such armies are the pet toys of aristocratic generals,
and are easily turned against the people by tyrants and by ambitious
Soldi®'#; but the hero-armies are the armies of citizens, less dainty in
dress, less exact in marching, less finished in evolutions, but men
who fight for home and -wife, who draw sword in a just quarrel, but
to please no prince’s whim; men like Cromwell’s Ironsides, and like
Hampden’s yeomen; men who are terrible in war because lovers of
peace; men who can never be defeated while living; men who know
how to die, but not how to yield.
What remedy is there for prostitution other than that attendant
upon a celibate standing army ? So far as the women are concerned,
the real remedy for prostitution is to give women opportunities of
gaining fairly paid employment. By far the greater number of pros
titutes are such for a living. Men are immoral for their amusement;
Women are immoral for bread. Ladies in the upper classes have no
conception of the stress of agony that drives many a forlorn girl “ on
th® streets”. If some of them would try what life is like when it
consists of making shirts at three halfpence each (cotton not provided),
and starving on the money earned, they would perhaps learn to speak
tt-Or® gently of “those horrid women”. Lack of bread makes many
* girl sell herself, and, once fallen, she is doomed. On the one side
are eelf-respect, incessant toil, starvation ; on the other side prostitu
tion, amusement, plenty. We may reverence the heroic virtue that
mists, but we can scarcely dare to speak harshly of the frailty that
submits. Remunerative employment would half empty the streets;
pay women, for the same work, the same wage that men receive ; let
sex be no disqualification; let women be trained to labor, and edu
cated for self-support; then the greatest of all remedies will be
applied to the cure of prostitution, and women will cease to sell their
bodies when they are able to sell their labor.
The second great remedy, as regards the women, is that society
«hmild make recovery more possible to them. Many a young and lovinggirl is betrayed through her love and her trust; having “fallen” she is
looked down upon by all; deserted, she is aided by none ; everybody
pushes her away, and she is driven on the streets, and in despair,
.reckless, hopeless, she becomes what all around call her, and drearily
sinks to the level assigned her by the world. Meanwhile her seducer
passes unrebuked, and in the families where she would not be admitted
fts seullery-maid he is welcomed as fit husband for the daughter of
the house. . That which has ruined her and many others is only being
’. *n t^ie circles where he moves. A public opinion which
should,be just is sorely needed. The act so venial in the man cannot
be a crime in the woman, and if, as it is said, men must be immoral,
then those who are necessary to them ought not to be looked down
upon for their usefulness. We ask for justice equal to both sexes:
punishment for both, if their intercourse be a crime against society ;
�8
THE LEGALISATION OF FEMALE SLAVERY IN ENGLAND,
immunity for both, if it be a necessary weakness. We hold up one
standard of purity for both, and urge the nobility of sexual morality
on man and woman alike.
More reasonable marriage laws would also tend to lessen prostitution.
Much secret immorality is caused by making the marriage tie so
unfairly stringent as it is to-day; people who are physically and
mentally antagonistic to each other are bound together for life, instead
of being able to gain a divorce without dishonor, and to be set free,
to find in a more congenial union the happiness they have failed to
find with each other. Reasonable facility of divorce would tend to
morality, and would strengthen the bond of union between those who
really loved, who would then feel that their true unity lay in them
selves more than in the marriage ceremony, and was a willing, ever
renewed mutual dedication instead of a hard compulsion.
But at the root of all reform lies the inculcation of a higher morality
than at present prevails. We need to learn a deeper reverence for
nature, and therefore a sharper repugnance for all disregard of
physical and moral law. Young men need to learn reverence
for. themselves and for the physical powers they possess, powers
which tend to happiness when rightly exercised, to misery and
degradation when abused. They need also to learn reverence for the
humanity in those around them, and the duty of guarding in every
woman everything which they honor in mother, wife, and daughter.
If a man realised that in buying a prostitute he was buying the
womanhood of those he loved at home, he would shrink back from
such sacrilege as from the touch of a leper. Woman should be man’s
inspiration, not his degradation; woman’s love should be his prize for
noble effort, not his purchased toy; the touch of a woman’s lips
should breathe of love and not of money, and the clasp of the wife
should tell of passionate devotion and supremest loyalty, and never be
mingled in thought with the memory of arms which were bought by
a bribe, of caress that was paid for in gold.
ONE PENNY.
Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Brablaugh, 63, Fleet Street,
London, E.C.—1885.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Victorian Blogging
Description
An account of the resource
A collection of digitised nineteenth-century pamphlets from Conway Hall Library & Archives. This includes the Conway Tracts, Moncure Conway's personal pamphlet library; the Morris Tracts, donated to the library by Miss Morris in 1904; the National Secular Society's pamphlet library and others. The Conway Tracts were bound with additional ephemera, such as lecture programmes and handwritten notes.<br /><br />Please note that these digitised pamphlets have been edited to maximise the accuracy of the OCR, ensuring they are text searchable. If you would like to view un-edited, full-colour versions of any of our pamphlets, please email librarian@conwayhall.org.uk.<br /><br /><span><img src="http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/sites/default/files/media/attachments/TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" width="238" height="91" alt="TNLHLF_Colour_Logo_English_RGB_0_0.jpg" /></span>
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Conway Hall Library & Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2018
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Conway Hall Ethical Society
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
Pamphlet
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
The legalisation of female slavery in England
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Besant, Annie Wood [1847-1933]
Description
An account of the resource
Place of publication: [London]
Collation: 8 p. ; 18 cm.
Notes: Reprinted from the National Reformer, June 4, 1976. Printed by Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh. Date of publication from British Library catalogue. Part of the NSS pamphlet collection.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
[s.l.].
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
[1885]
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
N067
Subject
The topic of the resource
Women's rights
Prostitution
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/"><img src="http://i.creativecommons.org/p/mark/1.0/88x31.png" alt="Public Domain Mark" /></a><span> </span><br /><span>This work (The legalisation of female slavery in England), identified by </span><a href="https://conwayhallcollections.omeka.net/items/show/www.conwayhall.org.uk"><span>Humanist Library and Archives</span></a><span>, is free of known copyright restrictions.</span>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
English
NSS
Prostitution
Sex Workers
Women
Women-England
Women's Rights