Danger of Infringing the Liberty of the Subject.

I have no hesitation in admitting that the private life of the individual, so far as it does not affect society at large, is the concern of the individual alone, and in no way whatever of the state, and that any attempt on the part of the legislature to control the moral conduct of the individual, whether man or woman, is incompatible with the freedom which is the birthright of every person born in this country. This, however, is a very different case from that with which it is proposed to deal. The title of the Act sufficiently indicates that no infringement of individual freedom is intended, except so far as such freedom infringes on the public health. We desire to check the spread of contagious disease, and claim the right to interfere with the pursuits that produce the mischief. This principle is not a new one, as Mr. Simon, with strange inconsistency, suggests in his Report to which I have already alluded, when he tells us at page 13 that "prima facie the true policy of Government is to regard the prevention of venereal diseases as matter of exclusively private concern," but is in accordance with the principle so well enunciated by the same gentleman at page 31 page 21 of his Report, when dealing with a question that he could consider without prejudice. He there says that "it is the almost completely expressed intention of our law that all such states of property, and all such modes of personal action or inaction as may be of danger to the public health should be brought within scope of summary procedure and prevention" It is also untrue as Mr. Simon conceives, "that the principle at stake is whether the civil fornicant may reasonably look to constituted authorities to protect him in his commerce with prostitutes," (page 18); if it were, there might perhaps be some force in the argument that to interfere with women, in order to prevent their infecting men who can at their own option visit or abstain from visiting them, would be an unjustifiable interference with their liberty, though even this would seem to savour somewhat of a sacrifice of common sense to sentiment. With such a question, however, I am not called upon to deal. What we have to consider is, whether to prevent the spread of a contagious disorder, the effects of which are not confined to the person first infected, or whoso own act entailed the suffering, but which recoil to an infinite extent upon innocent persons, is justifiable or not. Is it, I ask with some confidence, possible to distinguish that last case in principle from the other cases of preventable disease with which the legislature interferes? An attempt has been made to do so by the Ladies National Association for the repeal of the Contagious Acts.

We are told that "unlike all other laws for the repression of contagious diseases to which both men and women are liable, these two apply to women only, men being wholly exempt from their penalties." I may remark, by the way, that this idea of penalty and punishment, which runs through the whole of the ladies' appeal, is most unfounded. The provisions of the Act are sanitary and merciful; those only are obnoxious to penalties under the Act who offend against its provisions. In any case where it is possible for men to offend, they are included in the penalties. It is evident that the law cannot deal with remote causes; it can only deal with those that are immediate. Whether man's vice or woman's is page 32 the cause that prostitution exists, is a very wide question to enter upon, and one not easily answered—one calculated, moreover, to gratify curiosity rather than to serve any useful practical end. Let the original cause be what it may, the fact remains that there is a certain class of women productive of the greatest injury to the community. There is no corresponding class among men; if there were, we would attempt to deal with it. Prostitutes are the direct, visible cause of the prevalence of syphilis; it is among them that we find "such modes of personal action as may be of danger to the public health," and we propose to extend these Acts on the principle lying at the very root of the existence of society, that, for the common good and for the advantages obtainable by this means only, each member of the state must be content to be deprived of the power to do exactly as he pleases—that is, must surrender for the sake of social order a portion of his freedom. So much for the arguments adduced against the proposed legislation on the ground of interfering with the liberty of the subject. But, after all, what is this liberty? It is not liberty, but wanton licence. It is not freedom, but, lawless indulgence.

"They talk, sir," says Dr. Guthrie, "of the liberty of the subject. Let no man confound the liberty of the subject with licence and licentiousness, and I hold that the worst enemy of liberty is he who does so confound them. Why, the liberty is all on the side of evil-doers."

I now turn to the