“I am desired to inform you that you appear to ask no more than was offered by the Court in their resolution of the 8th ultimo, in which it was stated that, while the Court were restrained by legal doubts as to the power of the University to grant degrees to women from considering ‘the expediency of taking steps to obtain, in favour of female students, an alteration of an ordinance which might be held not to apply to women,’ they were ‘at the same time desirous to remove, so far as possible, any present obstacle in the way of a complete medical education being given to women; provided always that medical instruction to women be imparted in strictly separate classes.’ On the assumption, therefore, that while you at present decline the offer made by the Court with reference to certificates of proficiency, you now ask merely that arrangements should be made for completing the medical education of yourself and the other ladies on behalf of whom you write, I am to state that the Court are quite ready to meet your views. If, therefore, the names of extra-academical teachers of the required medical subjects be submitted by yourself, or by the Senatus, the Court will be prepared to consider the respective fitness of the persons so named to be authorised to hold medical classes for women who have, in this or former sessions, been matriculated students of the University, and also the conditions and regulations under which such classes should be held. It is, however, to be distinctly understood that such arrangements are not to be founded on as implying any right in women to obtain medical degrees, or as conferring any such right upon the students referred to.”
My friends, as I say, congratulated me on this apparently important concession; but to make assurance doubly sure, I resolved to have absolute official confirmation of the apparent meaning of the Resolution, and therefore addressed another letter to the Court, in which, after thanking them for their apparent good intentions, I enquired whether I was correct in understanding—
“1. That, though you at present give us no pledge respecting our ultimate graduation, it is your intention to consider the proposed extra-mural courses as ‘qualifying’ for graduation, and that you will take such measures as may be necessary to secure that they will be so accepted, if it is subsequently determined that the University has the power of granting degrees to women.
“2. That we shall be admitted in due course to the ordinary Professional Examinations, on presentation of the proper certificates of attendance on the said extra-mural classes.”
In reply, I was calmly informed that the Court meant nothing of the kind; that they would not agree to count any classes we might take as qualifying, and that in fact they would not stir a finger in any way whatever to enable us to become legally qualified doctors, though they might, if we spent a good many years of labour and a quite unlimited sum of money in obtaining our education, give us at the end these wonderful Certificates of Proficiency, which would be worth exactly—Nothing!
What had been the meaning of the previous letter of apparent concession I confess myself quite at a loss to conceive. What advantage could accrue to us from submitting the names of extramural teachers to the Court, in which Professor Christison was the only medical man, I have never been able to guess, since the Court did not intend to take any means to make their teaching qualify for graduation, and we hardly needed its sanction in order to make private arrangements for non-qualifying instruction! One is inclined to wonder whether the idea was that the University Court possessed some supernatural power, analogous to that supposed by certain churches to reside in episcopal laying on of hands, which would in a miraculous way benefit those lecturers whom they might “authorise” to teach us, though such teaching was to be given in place and manner wholly unconnected with that University with which I had supposed their functions to be exclusively connected. However, I am content to leave this among the unexplained mysteries, with very hearty thankfulness that, at least, by timely enquiries, we saved ourselves from a still more hopeless waste of time and money, which indeed we were on the point of incurring, in reliance on the good faith of the Court, and the apparent meaning of its mysterious Resolution.[110]
Having, however, at length arrived at a certainty that the Medical Faculty would rest with nothing short of our expulsion, if by any possibility they could attain that end; that the Senatus, though far more friendly, had not a sufficient majority of liberal votes to secure the permanent concession of our claims, however just, in the teeth of the strong medical opposition; and that the University Court would offer only such concessions as were quite valueless for our end, it became clear that it was useless to prolong the series of supplications which had, for nearly a year, been addressed in vain to one after another of the the ruling powers of the University.
On the other hand, we had no less authority than that of the Lord Advocate of Scotland for believing that we were absolutely entitled to what we had so humbly solicited, and that a Court of law would quietly award to us what seemed unattainable by any other means; we had the very widely spread and daily increasing sympathy of the community at large, and received constant offers of help from friends of every kind, who were none the less inclined to befriend us because our opponents stood in high places, and were utterly relentless in their aims and reckless in their means. Under these circumstances, we have done the one thing that remained for us to do, we have brought an action of Declarator against the Senatus of the University;—praying to have it declared that the Senatus is bound, in some way or other, to enable us to complete our education, and to proceed to the medical degree which will entitle us to take place on the Medical Register among the legally qualified practitioners of medicine. By this action it will be decided,—once more to quote our great champion, the Scotsman,—whether, indeed, “a University can, with formal solemnity, and with the concurrence of all its component parts, decree the admission of women to study for the profession of medicine, and then deny them access to those means by which alone they can enter that profession; whether, indeed, a University is absolved from all duties towards such of its matriculated students as may have the misfortune to be women. It will have to be decided whether any corporate body can make a contract of which all the obligations are on one side, and can exact fees and demand obedience to regulations, without in its turn incurring any responsibility; and can at pleasure finally send empty away those whose presence is inconvenient, without any regard to the money and time and labour which they have expended in simple reliance upon its good faith.”[111]
It is a very great satisfaction to me to find that some of the most illustrious members of the Senatus have expressed their own opinion on these points in the most emphatic way, for they have refused utterly to be parties to the defence of this action, and have entered on the Record a Minute from which I extract the following passage:—
“We dissent from and protest against the Resolution of the Senatus of March 27, 1872, to undertake the defence of the action. This we do for the following reasons:—(1.) Because we see no just cause for opposing the admission of women to the study and practice of medicine, but on the contrary, consider that women who have honourably marked out such a course of life for themselves, ought to be forwarded and aided in their laudable endeavour as much as possible, by all who have the means, and especially by those having authority in any University or other Institution for Education; (2.) Because in particular, we feel such aid and encouragement, rather than opposition and discouragement, to be due from us to those women who have enrolled themselves in the University of Edinburgh, and we entirely concur with respect to them, in the desire expressed by Sir William Stirling-Maxwell, the Rector of the University, that they should obtain what they ask—namely, a complete medical education, crowned by a degree; (3.) Because we have seen no sufficient reason to doubt the legal and constitutional powers of our University, to make arrangements that would be perfectly adequate for the purpose, and we consider the public questioning of such powers, in present circumstances, by the University itself, or any of its component bodies, unnecessary, impolitic, and capable of being construed as a surrender of permanent rights and privileges of the University, in order to evade a temporary difficulty; (4.) Because, without pronouncing an opinion on the question now raised as to the legal rights which the pursuers have acquired by matriculation in the University, admission already to certain examinations, or otherwise, to demand from the University continued medical instruction and the degree on due qualification, we yet believe that they have thereby, and by the general tenor of the proceedings, both of the Senatus and of the University Court in their case, hitherto acquired a moral right, and created a public expectation, which the University is bound to meet by the full exercise of its powers in their behalf, even should it be with some trouble; (5.) Because, with these convictions, and notwithstanding our utmost respect for those of our colleagues from whom we may have the misfortune to differ on the subject, we should individually feel ashamed of appearing as defenders in such an action, and should account any such public appearance by us in the character of opponents to women desiring to enter an honoured and useful profession, a matter to our discredit.”[112]