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degrading character of the slavery to which women in houses licensed by the police are invariably and inevitably reduced.
England has ever claimed to throw her influence on the side of freedom. The glorious charter of liberty which our forefathers have handed down to us as a jewel of brilliant lustre in the English Crown. The slavery against which they contended was, however, a slavery to labour. But this is a slavery to base passions and unholy lust....
It is to abolish the horrors of such a slavery, that we seek your influence and aid. Our appeal involves no less than a demand for the entire abolition and repeal of the licensing systems in our Colonies, and that prostitution and its attendant evils may be dealt with according to the principles and by the processes of ordinary laws.
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Your Lordship must necessarily be aware that the Municipal Council of Paris have, after many years of investigation, taken this step, and condemned the system of licensed prostitution which for nearly a century has spread disease and moral blight in that City. They have unanimously voted its entire abolition. In lieu of prison hospitals, they decide to arrange for the treatment of patients afflicted with venereal disease in the ordinary voluntary hospitals, and to deal with any offenders against decency and personal right according as the law directs.
Whilst recognising your responsibility in this matter to be chiefly in our Colonies, we would appeal to your Lordship also as a prominent member of the Cabinet, praying you to lend your influence in favour of the Repeal of the English Contagious Diseases Act.
The evidence laid before the House of Commons Committee, the conclusions to be derived from which are so admirably set forth in the Report framed by the Minority of that Committee, will be sufficient condemnation of the system to every impartial reader. The more we examine this question and drag into the light all the abominations springing out of it, the more we are led to the conviction that the sins against justice and against morality, which we find always characterising every system of State Regulated Vice, spring from the attempt to deal with prostitution in an exceptional manner and apply to it arbitrary police discretion instead of the ordinary law.
It is our conviction that in the sphere of law and legislation, the task that lies before us is as simple as it is undoubtedly arduous; that we have to abolish all exceptional laws and all exceptional procedure, and vindicate the authority and restore the supremacy of the Common Law of our ancient Fatherland.
A. W. Williams, Chairman of the National Society for ...
M. George Butler, D.D., Canon of Winchester, on behalf of the British, Continental and General Federation,
Josephine E. Butler, on behalf of the Ladies National Association,
Ewing Whittle, M.D., M.R.C.P., on behalf of the Medical Association for Repeal,
Fred'k Wheeler, on behalf of Chatham & Rochester Repeal Committee,
Joseph Joyce, on behalf of the Worthing Men's Total League for the Repeal of the C.D. Acts,
Witham C. Crouch, on behalf of the Friends of Bristol,
Relay Secretary of the Repeal Association,
Louisa Martindale, on behalf of the Federation for the Abolition of Regulations re Prostitution,
John Rhodes, on behalf of the Association for Repeal,
Lettice Floyd, J.P., on behalf of the ...
Notes in the Woolwich Committee for Repeal,
... went on behalf of the Metropolitan ...
Poppyton Guthrie, on behalf of the ...
Free Churches, Sidney, on behalf of the Milling Men's National League for the Tower Hamlets Branch for Repeal,
Edward Grimwade, for Ipswich Auxiliary ...