WIFE-TORTURE IN ENGLAND. 



53 



The replies to these questions were published 

 iu a parliamentary Blue-Book entitled " Reports 

 on the State of the Law relating to Brutal As- 

 saults," in 1875, and the following is a summary 

 of the results : 



There was a large consensus of opinion that 

 the law, as it now stands, is insufficient to effect 

 its purpose. Lord Chief-Justice Cockburn says : 

 " In my opiniou the present law against assaults 

 of brutal violence is not sufficiently stringent" 

 (p. 5), and Mr. Justice Lush, Mr. Justice Mellor, 

 Lord Chief-Baron Kelly, Baron Bramwell, Baron 

 Pigott, and Baron Pollock, express the same 

 judgment in almost the same words (pp. 7-19). 



Several of these, and also other judges, who 

 do not directly say that they consider the present 

 law insufficient, manifest their opinion that it is so 

 by recommending that (under various safeguards) 

 the penalty of flogging be added thereto. The 

 agreement of opinion of these great authorities 

 on this point appears (to the uninitiated) as if it 

 must have been sufficient to carry with it any 

 measure which had such weighty recommenda- 

 tion. 



The following are the opinions in favor of 

 flogging offenders in cases of brutal assaults : 



Lord Chief- Justice Cockburn, Mr. Justice 

 Blackburn, Mr. Justice Mellor, Mr. Justice Lush, 

 Mr. Justice Quain, Mr. Justice Archibald, Mr. 

 Justice Brett, Mr. Justice Grove, Lord Chief- 

 Baron Kelly, Baron Bramwell, Baron Pigott, 

 Baron Pollock, Baron Cleasby, and Baron Amph- 

 lett. The opinions of Lord Coleridge and Mr. 

 Justice Denman were hesitating, and the only de- 

 cided opponent of flogging at that time on the 

 judicial bench in England was Mr. Justice Keat- 

 ing. 



The chairmen of Quarter Sessions and magis- 

 trates in Sessions were, in sixty-four cases out 

 of the sixty-eight whence responses came to the 

 Home Office, in favor of flogging — Leftwich, Ox- 

 ford (county), Stafford (county), and the North 

 Riding, being the only exceptions. 



The recorders of forty-one towns were like- 

 wise in favor of flogging, and only those of Lin- 

 coln, Nottingham, and Wolverhampton, were op- 

 posed to it. The Recorders of Folkestone and 

 of Newcastle-on-Tyne added the recommendation 

 that a husband who had been flogged for a bru- 

 tal assault on his wife should be divorced from 

 her. 



On reading this summary it will doubtless to 

 many persons appear inexplicable that three 

 years should have elapsed since so important a 

 testimony was collected at the public expense, 



and at the trouble of so many eminent gentlemen 

 whose time was of infinite value ; and that, so far 

 as can be ascertained, absolutely nothing has 

 been done in the way of making practical use of 

 it. During the interval scores of bills, on every 

 sort and kind of question interesting to the repre- 

 sented sex, have passed through Parliament ; but 

 this question, on which the lives of women lit- 

 erally hang, has never been even mooted since 

 Lord Beaconsfield so complacently assured its soli- 

 tary champion that " her Majesty's Government 

 would bear in mind the evident feeling of the 

 House on the subject." Something like 6,000 

 women, judging by the judicial statistics, have 

 been, in the intervening years, " brutally assault- 

 ed " — that is, maimed, blinded, trampled, burned, 

 and in no inconsiderable number of instances 

 murdered outright — and several thousand chil- 

 dren have been brought up to witness scenes 

 which might, as Colonel Leigh said, " infernalize 

 a whole generation." Nevertheless, the news- 

 papers go on boasting of elementary education, 

 and Parliament busies itself in its celebrated ele- 

 phant's trunk fashion, alternately rending oaks 

 and picking up sixpences ; but this evil remains 

 untouched ! 



The fault does not lie with the Home Office — 

 scarcely even with Parliament, except so far as 

 Parliament persists in refusing to half the nation 

 those political rights which alone can, under our 

 present order of things, secure attention to any 

 claims. We live in these days under Government 

 by pressure, and the Home Office must attend 

 first to the claims which are backed by political 

 pressure ; and members of Parliament must at- 

 tend to the subjects pressed by their constituents ; 

 and the claims and subjects which are not sup- 

 ported by such political pressure must go to the 

 wall. 



Nevertheless, when we women of the upper 

 ranks — constitutionally qualified by the posses- 

 sion of property (and, I may be permitted to add, 

 naturally qualified by education and intelligence 

 at least up to the level of those of the " illiterate " 

 order of voters) to exercise through the suffrage 

 that pressure on Parliament — are refused that 

 privilege, and told year after year by smiling sen- 

 ators that we have no need whatever for it, that 

 we form no " class," and that we may absolutely 

 and always rely on men to prove the deepest and 

 tenderest concern for everything which concerns 

 the welfare of women, shall we not point to these 

 long-neglected wrongs of our trampled sisters, 

 and denounce that boast of the equal concern of 

 men for women as — a falsehood ? 



