747
To the Right Honorable
The Earl of Derby
Her Majesty's Secretary of State for the Colonies.
2. April 17th. 1883
Your Memorialists desire to thank your lordship for according to them this audience. As Englishmen representing various religious opinions and political sentiments, we are nevertheless united in the strong conviction that it is wrong for the State to enter into compact with vice.
As representing several organizations in the United Kingdom formed to obtain the total Repeal of the laws embodying such a compact, and representing also a federation which has agencies and adherents, not only in this Country but in all parts of the world, we have made ourselves thoroughly acquainted with the subject of "State-Regulation of Vice" in all its forms and all its bearings.
The interests of justice and of the public health alike require that measures (that could forcibly be applied) to the profligate, should impartially be applied to both sexes; while it should in addition be borne in mind that it is profligate men alone who ever can directly injure the innocent. But these systems aim at preserving the health of profligate men by exceptional methods of dealing with unfortunate women. It is obvious that a man's health can be affected by the medical treatment of a prostitute, unless he consorts with her. These systems, therefore, contemplate and expect that men will commit fornication and proceed to take measures beforehand for their protection from certain physical consequences of the act – they "make provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof." Against any such encouragement of male profligacy by the sacrifice of female liberty on the part of the law, which should be "a terror to evil-doers," we shall solemnly and incessantly protest.
The Legislation embodying the system in England, the Contagious Diseases Act (Women), 1866-69, seriously infringes the liberty of the subject and the equal responsibility...