XXXVII.
3, 4.—“... lowest boor is lordly ‘baron’ styled,
And highest bride as common ‘feme’ reviled.”
“... husband and wife; or, as most of our elder law books call them, ‘baron’ and ‘feme.’”—(Blackstone’s “Commentaries,” Bk. I. Chap. 15.)
But the context of the words “baron” and “feme” involved something more than a mere façon de parler of the law books. Edward Christian says, in Note 23 to the Chapter in “Blackstone” above quoted:—“Husband and wife, in the language of the law, are styled baron and feme; the word baron, or lord, attributes to the husband not a very courteous superiority. But we might be inclined to think this merely an unmeaning technical phrase, if we did not recollect, that if the baron kills his feme it is the same as if he had killed a stranger or any other person; but if the feme kills her baron it is regarded by the laws as a much more atrocious crime, as she not only breaks through the restraints of humanity and conjugal affection, but throws off all subjection to the authority of her husband. And, therefore, the law denominates her crime a species of treason, and condemns her to the same punishment as if she had killed the king. And for every species of treason (though in petit treason the punishment of men was only to be drawn and hanged), till the 30 Geo. III., Chap. 48, the sentence of woman was to be drawn and burnt alive.”
And Mr. Courtney Kenny says, on the same point, that the English Law of Marriage in the twelfth century had “clothed the humblest husband with more than the authority of a feudal lord, and merged his wife’s legal existence altogether in his own.”—(“History of the Law of Married Women’s Property,” p. 8.)
And he exemplifies the position of the “feme” as being accurately depicted in the words of Petruchio:—
“I will be master of what is mine own,
She is my goods, my chattels; she is my house,
My household stuff, my field, my barn,
My horse, my ox, my ass, my anything.”
—(“The Taming of the Shrew,” Act III., scene 2.)
The picture of the past masculine proprietorship and “bullyism” is scarcely overdrawn. Ere a distant day Englishmen will shudder in reflecting on the male creatures who were their progenitors.
5, 6.—“The tardier fear that grants the clown a share
In his own governance, denies it her.”
By a leading article on Woman Suffrage, in the Times of 29th April, 1892, a clear light is thrown on the causes which largely influenced the extension of the Parliamentary franchise to the poorer class of male citizens,—“a share of political power which they are not particularly well fitted to use,” says the Times;—and which denied the same right of franchise to women of whatever class. The intellect of the Times enounces that—
“Without desiring to disparage the sex in any way, we must venture to maintain that in both camps a large female contingent would be a mischievous element. The female Conservative politician would be an obstacle to all rational reform; the female Liberal politician would be the advocate of every crude and febrile innovation. No doubt we have put plausible arguments in the mouths of mere logic-choppers by treating the franchise as a right rather than as a privilege and a trust. Men can demand a share of political power which they are not particularly well fitted to use, because they possess de facto a share of the physical force upon which all political arrangements ultimately repose. Women do not possess such physical force, and, therefore, can prefer no such claim.”
Passing over, as unworthy of serious refutation, the wild assertions due to sex-bias in the first part of the above extract, it may be noted how instantly the lauded masculine weapon of logic is discarded and contemned as soon as it points in the direction of equal justice for woman. The “physical force” question is further dealt with in Note XLV., 6. But considering the words we have italicised, does not the whole of the Times exposition as above justify the appellation of cowardly “fear”? (See also p. 78.)
Id.... Yet an even more unworthy thing than denial of the suffrage has taken place, in that English women have been really robbed of their earlier franchises. A lady Poor Law Guardian of the Tewkesbury Union has written:—
“... the present position of women in regard to the various franchises is anomalous and contradictory, unworthy of that great growth of freedom which the nineteenth century has given to men, and degenerate as regards the position which women held in the days of the Plantagenets and the Tudors. Freedom for women has not broadened down ‘from precedent to precedent.’ Rather has it suffered by unnecessary legislative interference. Every woman, except the Queen, is, politically, non-existent. It was not always so. Restrictions unknown to our ancient constitution have crept in.... Chief Justice Lee is reported to have cited a case (in a manuscript collection of Hakewell’s), Catherine v. Surrey, in which it was expressly decided, that a feme sole, if she has a freehold, may vote for members of Parliament; and a further one (from the same collection), Holt v. Lyle, in which it was decided, that a feme sole householder may claim a voice for Parliament men; but, if married, her husband must vote for her; whilst Justice Page declared, ‘I see no disability in a woman from voting for a Parliament man.’ So closely, in the minds of our Judges, were the local and Parliamentary franchises bound up, that a question as to the rights of women in local voting seemed to involve considerations as to their right to vote for Parliament men.
“Yet, even in the matter of these local franchises, women have suffered, and do suffer, from legislative tinkering and sex-biassed decisions in our law courts.
“Down to 1835, women, possessing the qualifications which entitled men to vote, voted freely in municipal elections, and in some important cities, such as London and Edinburgh, the civic rights even of married women, possessing a separate qualification from the husband, were well established. The Municipal Corporations Act of 1835, however (passed by the Whig administration of Lord Melbourne), was framed upon the evil precedent of the Reform Act of 1832, and by the use of the words ‘male persons,’ in treating of the franchises under it, disfranchised every woman in the boroughs to which it applied, and this disfranchisement lasted for thirty-four years.
“Nevertheless, in non-corporate districts, women continued to vote as freely as before, and thus secured the ultimate restitution of the rights of their disfranchised sisters in incorporated districts; for, when in 1869, on the consideration of the Municipal Franchise Bill of that year, these peculiar facts were brought to the notice of the House of Commons, and it was shown that the incorporation of any district involved the summary disfranchisement of the women ratepayers, the House, without a dissentient word, or any shadow of opposition, adopted the proposal to omit the word ‘male’ before the word ‘person’ in Section 1 of the Bill, and thus restored the rights of the women ratepayers, of whom many thousands voted, as a consequence of the passing of the Act, in the municipal elections of the following November.”—Mrs. Harriett McIlquham (“The Enfranchisement of Women: An Ancient Right, a Modern Need,” pp. 5, 12, 13.)
8.—“... infants, felons, fools ...”
This legal courteousness has afforded Miss Frances Power Cobbe the text for an instructive paper: “Criminals, Idiots, Women, and Minors: Is the Classification Sound?” (Fraser’s Magazine, December, 1868.)
A recent instance of the official collocation is to be found in the Act 5 and 6 Vict., Cap. 35, Sec. 41:—
“And be it enacted, that the trustee, guardian, tutor, curator, or committee of any person, being an infant, or married woman, lunatic, idiot, or insane, and having the direction, control, or management of the property or concern of such infant, married woman, lunatic, idiot, or insane person, whether such infant, married woman, lunatic, idiot, or insane person shall reside in the United Kingdom or not,” etc., etc.