English and French medical opinion on the immoral, despotic, and useless laws for the sanitary regulation of vice, known as the Contagious Diseases Acts, 1866-69.

Date:
[between 1880 and 1889?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: English and French medical opinion on the immoral, despotic, and useless laws for the sanitary regulation of vice, known as the Contagious Diseases Acts, 1866-69. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    EEV. T. H. GREGG, D.D., M.D.:-«'! was very much in favour of these Acts at one time on medical grounds. ... I Lave since looked more fully into the subject, and am now strongly opposed to this legisla- tion.—1878. The Late holmes COOTE,the eminent surgeon of St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and a member of the Royal Commission on the Acts (1871), declared that— The earnest men who met some years ago to originate' ■the movement which terminated in the passing of the Contagious Diseases Act, had little idea of the use that would be made of their labours and advice. As one of those who took an active part in all that then tran- :spired, I loudly maintain that the idea of the compulsory examination of women, their enforced subjection to the police, their exposure to the penalties of registration and imprisonment, were views which would have been scouted by the gentlemen who met to devise means of giving sheltei and protection to unfortunate females. (After his experience as a Royal ■Commissioner^on these Acts, this gentleman joined the Executive Com- mittee of the National Association for the Repeal of the Acts.) The Late JAMES MILLER, F.R.S.E., Pkofessor of Surgery in the TJniversity op Edinburgh :—The medical man must be conjoined with the policeman in this dirty and degrading work. . . Is this work for an educated gentleman ? for a member of a liberal and enlightened profession ? JOHN SIMON, C.B.; F.R.C.S., President op the Royal College os Surgeons; Late Medical Oppicer op the Privy Council, &c. :—As regards our power of preventing contagious diseases, by such a super- intendence of prostitution as is proposed, it is certain that no appreci- iible good would be got except with much organization, and at very large costs of money; and there are strong reasons for believing that the gain so purchased would, on analysis, be found to belong very ^predominantly to those kinds of contagious diseases in which the com- munity has little or no permanent interest. . . . And recognising -how incomplete is hitherto our sanitary system, and particularly how little pressure is yet put on local authorities in matters of far more general importance to life ; recognising, for instance, that it is almost entirely a question of private charity, whether fever hospitals exist in a town, and that such hospitals are most insufficiently provided; I cannot but think that, during this state of things, compulsory legisla- tion in the present matter would he a disproportion not to he justified.— (Extract from Report to the Privy Council on the Proposed Extension of the Acts to the Civil Population.)—1869. C. H. F. ROUTH, M.D., Consulting Physician fob Diseases of ■Women, &c., London :— The moral ground is with me the strongest point against these Acts, and I cannot imagine how medical men over- look this. . . . The immorahty and unconstitutional nature of these Acts must ultimately raise such a storm that no minister will be able to stand who gives them his support.—1878. W. BURNS THOMPSON, F.R.C.S., Superintendent of the Medical Missionary Training Institution and Dispensary, Edinburgh :— I have done professional duty for fifteen years, in the districts usually j ■supposed to suffer most from such ailments, and for ten 5'^ears have I stood at the head of the Edinburgh Dispensary, where I had good t - o ' - i^i