Contagious Diseases Acts

The Contagious Diseases Acts were originally passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom in 1864, with further alterations and editions made to it in 1866 and 1869. In 1862, a committee was established to inquire into venereal disease in the armed forces; on its recommendation the first Contagious Diseases Act was passed. The legislation allowed police officers to arrest prostitutes in certain ports and army towns, and the women were then subjected to compulsory checks for venereal disease. If a woman was declared to be infected, she would be confined in what was known as a ‘Lock Hospital’ until ‘cured’. The original act was only lawful in a few selected naval ports and army towns, but by 1869 the acts had been extended to be in operation in eighteen ‘subjected districts’

The Act of 1864 stated that women found to be infected could be interned in locked hospitals for up to three months, a period gradually extended to one year with the 1869 Act. These measures were justified by medical and military officials as the most effective method to shield men from venereal disease. As military men were discouraged from marriage and homosexual behaviour was criminal, prostitution was considered a necessary evil. However, no provision was made for the examination of prostitutes' clientele, which became one of the many points of contention in a campaign to repeal the Acts.

After 1866, proposals were introduced to extend the acts to the north of England and to the civilian population. It was suggested that this extension would regulate prostitution and stop street disorders caused by it in large cities.

The issue of the Contagious Diseases Act and venereal disease created significant controversy within Victorian Society. Known as the ‘Social Disease’, the acts themselves affected thousands of people's lives, from campaigners to prostitutes themselves. It exploded the debate over the double standards between men and women. It was one of the first political issues that led to women organizing themselves and actively campaigning for their rights.

The acts demonstrated the degree of double standards between men and women in Victorian society. Men were responsible for the demand for prostitutes, yet only women had to endure humiliating personal medical examinations and be contained in locked hospitals if found to be infected; women's reputations were threatened but not men's. The double standards of men were a key part in Josephine Butler's campaigns for the repeal of the acts. In one of her public letters, she allowed a prostitute to deliver her own account of her personal encounters with men:

“It is men, only men, from the first to the last that we have to do with! To please a man I did wrong at first, then I was flung about from man to man. Men police lay hands on us. By men we are examined, handled, doctored. In the hospital it is a man again who makes prayer and reads the Bible for us. We are had up before magistrates who are men, and we never get out of the hands of men till we die!”