Contagious Diseases Act

Question 1

What was the Ladies’ National Association?

Answer 1

• Formed in 1869 by Wolstenholme. Led by Butler
• Created a ‘Ladies Protest’ signed by 124 members & published in the Daily News.
• The protest caused a sensation and LNA leaders injected energy and vitality into the repeal campaign.

Question 2

Who made up the LNA?

Answer 2

• Leaders of LNA came from affluent, middle class backgrounds - moral & political commitment & financial means; keen social conscience & religious fervour.
• Butler was deemed perfect for their leader as she had more respectable status compared to Wolstenholme.

Question 3

What methods did the LNA use?

Answer 3

• They used petitioning: 1870-1886 18,000 petitions signed by 2.5 million people. Public meetings were held in Churches, town halls & working men’s clubs to collect signatures.
• The most successful tactic was challenging Liberal candidates at by-elections.

Question 4

Success of the LNA?

Answer 4

• LNA led to a nationwide network of repeal organisations with many provincial & local branches
• They successfully defeated Storks at the Colchester by-election of 1870.
• Attracted widespread publicity – especially as it was the participation of females; women spoke publicly about venereal disease & prostitution; press were impressed at the women’s courage

Question 5

Drawbacks of the LNA?

Answer 5

• The victory against the Storks at the Colchester by-election was short-lived as it handed the Conservatives victory

Question 6

What was “The Shield”?

Answer 6

• The Shield (newspaper of LNA) provided energy for the movement when it was fading by publishing cases of women who had been persecuted by the CD Acts eg Mrs Percy
• The Shield gave publicity to the movement by publishing cases of unfair persecution of women & this re-generated the movement

Question 7

What is a by-election?

Answer 7

By elections are elections not during regular election times that occur when a space appears in the House of Commons.

Question 8

Who was Elizabeth Wolstenholme?

Answer 8

• Campaigner for women’s rights to higher education, inherit property, gain the vote and repeal the Contagious Diseases Act.

Question 9

When was the LNA formed?

Answer 9

1869

Question 10

How effective was Wolstenholme’s campaign?

Answer 10

Herself had little impact as she was deemed less respectable than Butler as she actively objected to marriage and was radical activist.
(In exam, pair with the LNA as she set it up)

Question 11

Why was the Contagious disease act passed?

Answer 11

As an attempt to limit the spread of venereal (sexually transmitted) diseases among the military. Women were tested as carriers of disease

Question 12

Who was Josephine Butler?

Answer 12

The charismatic leader of the LNA. She was a gifted speaker who came from a respectable background. She was a mother and married to a Church minister and Christian.

Question 13

Why did Josephine Butler feel passionately towards the CDA and LNA?

Answer 13

After her six year old had passed away, she was determined to find women is worse conditions than herself. She believed CD act legalised prostitution and found this morally wrong.

Question 14

What methods did Josephine butler use?

Answer 14

She travelled 3700 miles and addressed 99 meetings regarding the CDA.

Question 15

What were the Victorian attitudes to Prostitution?

Answer 15

-Prostitution seen as a moral threat to society
-500,000 Prostitutes probably operated in England
-Syphilis caused blindness, deafness and insanity
It challenged the middle class view of women as pure
-‘Fallen women’ were seen as whores
-Prostitutes contaminated society and threatened institution of marriage & sanctity of family
-Viewed as a cause of public disorder – often found in pubs & places of public entertainment

Question 16

When was John William Actons book published?

Answer 16

1857

Question 17

What did John William Acton write about in his book?

Answer 17

Argued that prostitution was a social necessity & feared that venereal diseases were a danger to the health of the population (Acton was a London Surgeon)

Question 18

How was the Crimean war a catalyst for the CDA?

Answer 18

Raised concern about the health of the military.
37% sick cases were due to venereal disease by 1860

Question 19

When was the committee enquiry into venereal disease in the army?

Answer 19

1862

Question 20

What was the committee Enquiry into VD?

Answer 20

Members included Florence Nightingale campaigned for better hospital and barrack sanitation.
Sir John Liddell, a navy medical general, argued for the regulation of prostitutes as there were effective similar compulsory exams in British colonies like India and Hong Kong.

Question 20

What were the biggest VD problems in the army?

Answer 20

gonorrhoea and syphilis.

Question 21

What was the contagious diseases act?

Answer 21

It authorised police in specific garrison towns and ports in England and Ireland to arrest women if they were suspected as being a prostitute, register them and ensure they attended medical examination by army or navy surgeons.

Refusal to be inspected led to 2 months’ imprisonment

Question 22

What happened if women were found to be diseased?

Answer 22

they could be detained for up to three months in Lock Hospitals for treatment or until they were cured.

Question 23

Was the 1864 act a success?

Answer 23

Yes, decline of prostitutes in garrison towns, towns were orderly and clean

Question 24

How did the 1866 act add to the CDA act?

Answer 24

It widened scope of 1864 Act by covering more garrison towns

authorised a ‘system of periodic fortnightly inspection of all known prostitutes to be made compulsory’

Question 25

How did the 1869 act extend the CDA?

Answer 25

> Extended regulation to five additional ‘subjected districts’ (18 districts in total).

> Extended period of time women could be kept in hospital to nine months in the ‘Lock Hospitals’.

Question 26

Positive Impact of the CDA?

Answer 26

-regulated prostitution (infected women travelled voluntarily to protected areas to get free medical treatment.)
-Certificates provided on release became valuable assets.
-1871 Royal Commission found that there was a reduced occurrence of scabies
- Less soldiers were being hospitalised in protected areas than those in unprotected areas.

Question 27

The Negative impact of CDA?

Answer 27

> There were still no checks on men so disease continued to spread.

-Some reform institutions refused to help women from lock hospitals as they opposed the act.
-Official intervention damaged relations between prostitutes & their local communities
- Lack of medical knowledge on the subject. Mercury pills did not cure it but helped with symptoms.

Question 28

What was the Ladies Protest and when was it created?

Answer 28

A protest by the LNA that gained 124 signatures from its members.
It was published in the Daily News in 1870.

Question 29

What was the impact of the Ladies Protest?

Answer 29

Within a few months all major provincial cities had repeal societies - many had ladies committees as well

Question 30

Why was Wolstenholme to thank for the repeal?

Answer 30

formed LNA because the National Association excluded females.
Wolstenholme asked Josephine Butler to organise campaign

Question 31

Why was Wolstenholme NOT entirely to thank for the repeal?

Answer 31

As an campaigner for women’s rights she was a possible hindrance to the group/ she was too radical to become the leader.

Question 32

Why was Butler to thank for the repeal?

Answer 32

Her courage and commitment to build support across both class and gender lines.
-She showed a ‘genuine respect and sympathy for working people’
-She invoked the fury of working men & talked of ‘surgical rape’
-She exposed the ‘double standard’ which justified access to ‘impure women’ while pointing out that men could still contaminate their innocent wives.
-She is now considered to have invented many of the strategies that would later be used by the suffragettes. She broke down the barrier against women’s participation in politics.

Question 33

Why was Butler NOT entirely to thank for the repeal?

Answer 33

> She revealed she did not go to the protected districts for 8 years ( disconnect between her leadership and the women most affected)
Butler blocked the proposal to replace the existing system of compulsory examinations with voluntary ones in 1871 as she wanted their full repeal. This delayed the actual.
It was her blocking of Stork’s by-election victory that led to Conservative victory by 1874 and six years of a Conservative govt which delayed repeal.

Question 34

Why was Nationwide agitation to thank for the repeal?

Answer 34

-Nationwide movements helped to make it into a mass movement.
-1872-73 a number of regional electoral leagues were organised in order to press for repeal:
-Northern Counties League led by Henry Wilson & Midlands Electoral League.
-They were always united in their hatred of immoral aristocrats who dominated the military & medical profession.
-Wilson ‘provided the backbone to the campaign waged by the LNA.’ (Paula Bartley).

Question 35

Why was Nationwide agitation NOT entirely to thank for the repeal?

Answer 35

-There were distinct differences, sometimes rivalries, between repeal organisations on the basis of class & gender. They formed separate methods of agitation
-Eg 1875 – a Working Men’s National League was established which excluded the middle class.

Question 36

Why was James Stansfeld to thank for the repeal?

Answer 36

> Stansfeld assumed national leadership of the National Association & set about making it a more effective pressure group
Stansfeld set out to get more ‘facts’, and more medical/scientific statistics collected by creating the National Medical Association in 1875.
In 1886 Gladstone realised he needed Stansfeld in his Cabinet and the price he had to pay was repeal of the C D Acts in 1886

Question 37

Why was James Stansfeld NOT entirely to thank for the repeal?

Answer 37

-Butler raised the profile of the issue and created the climate of opposition
-Henry Wilson, an MP, helped to create a political committee of Liberal MPs to push for repeal in Parliament.