Page:Wrong and Right Methods of Dealing with Social Evil - Elizabeth Blackwell (1883).djvu/73

Rh terest of women must join with the efforts of enlightened men in guarding children:

Firstly.—These important bills were not debated in the House of Commons. They were examined in the privacy of Committees, and run through in an almost empty House. At the passing of the bill of 1880 so little interest was felt in a measure vitally affecting womanhood, viz., the protection of girls—a bill which, if enforced, would strike the most powerful possible blow at licentiousness—that of the 650 gentlemen who compose the House of Commons, only eighty-six were present. The age of protection was lowered from the age of fourteen to thirteen by a majority of only forty-one in this small House, and without debate.

Secondly.—In examining the scanty record of the private Committees in which these bills were mutilated, it is seen that two arguments were used for lowering the age of protection. Let women and men weigh these arguments. The first argument put forth, is the fear that fraudulent representation might trouble men. That is, that if a vicious man commits fornication with a young girl, she may be, or may pretend to be, under the legal age of fourteen and so try to extort hush money from him.

The second argument is this: that as a girl may legally marry at twelve, and as she may actually become a mother at eleven years of age, or under, that