JURYWOMEN AND MODESTY.
ARECENT extremely disagreeable case in the Divorce Court has raised the question whether it is right to require women to sit on juries when much of the evidence is bound to be indecent and shocking. The newspaper controversy upon the subject has exhibited even more confusion of thought than one could have expected. In the case to which we have referred six women were on the jury, and it seems that part of the evidence was some indecent photographs. The Judge took the course of suggesting that the jurymen should look at the photographs and explain to the women as they thought fit, or as best they might—poor men ! one can reconstruct the scene— the bearing of this particular evidence upon the case. Sir Edward Marshall-Hall, one of the Counsel engaged, made a great profession or confession of the embarrassment he felt in referring to such subjects at all in the presence of the women of the jury.
There are three possible interpretations of Sir Edward Marshall-Hall's reiterated deprecations of the intense strain which was being put upon the women—or was it upon himself ? First there may be a desire on the part of Bench and Bar to prevent women serving on juries. Secondly; Sir Edward Marshall-Hall, . who of course was fully entitled to make the best possible fight for his client by means direct or indirect, may have found it convenient to appear to be fighting at a disadvantage—to be modestly withholding things which he would have liked to say had he been addressing a different audience. Thirdly, Sir Edward Marshall-Hall may have had no such thoughts in his mind, and may have been with enthusiastic sincerity championing the cause of keeping women untainted by knowledge of the world, the cause which has had so many champions in the Press. If the third interpretation be the right one, as it well may be, we can only say that we disagree with Sir Edward Marshall-Hall. Nor can we think that justice will ever be served by withholding relevant evidence from part of the jury. If an appeal from a verdict were made on the ground that certain evidence referred to in the summing-up of the Judge had never been before part of the jury, we imagine that such an appeal would be difficult to resist.
But on the facts, on grounds of sentiment, and on principle it seems to us that no change in the present though new practice is needed. A great many people seem to have forgotten that the Sex Disqualification Removal Act of 1919 gives a Judge, either at his own instance or upon application made by the parties, power to order that the jury shall be all men or all women. Further, he may, on application being made by a woman, grant her exemption from service by reason of the nature of the evidence to begiven and the issues to be tried. Thus unless a Judge refuses to excuse a woman who has been summoned for service on the jury, there is no obli- gation whatever on women to serve in certain cases. No Judge ought to put himself in the position of accepting women for the jury and then deploring their presence and withholding evidence from them. On general principle, however, we think it is a mistake to take fright and to pretend that a woman cannot face or ought not to face facts as well as men do. In their capacities as doctors and nurses women have long been required to contemplate pretty well all the horrors life can show. To their occasions for doing this their experience as magistrates has recently been added. It seems irrational to forbid women to serve in cases in which women are directly involved as parties—cases which would never have occurred had not some Helen been carried off to Troy. Women, as a type, can surely bear to hear about what things some women do or about what happens to some women. If it be said that there are many women who have not yet trained themselves to type—the type that can bear women's new responsibilities—the answer is that an Act of Parliament is ready to the rescue. Carlyle said that the introduction of clothes was the origin of indecency, and when one comes to think of it that remark contained the essence of the matter. It is also capable of an important application. Those who experience or pretend to portentous embarrassment in the presence of sordid or shocking facts prove that their minds have not quite that ideal degree of pure detachment which is indispensable to the really professional or scientific point of view. Women who have worked as doctors, or nurses, or who have been engaged in rescue work or in prisons, have (as we think all who have come across them in that work will acknowledge) a remarkable faculty for serenity, self-possession, and practical frankness in all circumstances. Certainly men have nothing to teach them in that respect.
• It is quite a common failing on the part of men who are chivalrous in a mistaken way or who are violently reaction- ary in the interests of the other sex to overstate the case on behalf of women. We remember hearing of the case of two cousins, a young man and a young woman, who were sent off to the theatre by a benevolent aunt. The next morning the cousins separately explained their experiences to their aunt. The play selected by the aunt had been an unhappy choice—it was of a highly doubtful character. Tom said to his aunt, " Of course I didn't mind, but I felt very uncomfortable about having taken Madge." Madge said to her aunt, " Of course it was all right for me, but I can't imagine what poor old. Torn thought of it." That is what often happens unbeknown to both sides, when it is not a question at all of an evening's amusement, but of the serious and professional service of one's country.
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