5 AUGUST 1938, Page 19

. , [To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] _

Sin,—The now famous Bourne case has had different reactions in different quarters, but the law remains as before. There is no criminal case-law, so far as felonies and misdemeanours are concerned, and obviously there never can be such. The law being as it is, to prevent the consequences of rape by abortion is clearly lynch law. The present law of abortion, being much too harsh for present day needs, seems to call for immediate amendment. If a private individual knows there are stolen goods in a certain house he is not justified in breaking into the house and recovering them, for this would be lynch law.

The police should be informed, that is the remedy. The same principles apply to the Bourne case, except that in such case the Medical Officer of Health for the district should have been empowered to take the part of the police. Unfortunately a large proportion of English criminal law is only lynch law, legalised by a gauze veil of the thinnest texture. We ought to have a criminal code, not a hotch-potch revision of existing laws. A code could be easily and quickly drawn and would do away with anomalies, fictions, lynch law and injustices.—