LAW AND JUSTICE—OUTRAGE UPON THE PERSON.—RESOLUTION. (Hansard, 5 August 1881)

§ MR. MACFARLANE

, in rising to move— That the administration of the Law in oases of outrage upon the person has long been a reproach to our Criminal Courts; that outrages and assaults of the most brutal character, especially upon married women, oven when they cause a cruel death, are commonly punished less severely than small offences against property; that the admission of the crime of drunkenness as an extenuation of other crimes is immoral, 1001 and acts as an incentive to persons about to commit outrages to wilfully deprive themselves of the guidance of reason; said, in bringing forward this subject he did not propose in any way to censure Her Majesty's Judges; but he desired to draw the attention of the House to the striking inequality of sentences passed upon persons guilty of offences against the person as compared with those passed upon persons guilty of offences, often of a trivial character, against property. Thus, whereas the Lord Chief Justice sentenced a man to six weeks' imprisonment who had, while drunk, assaulted his wife in such a manner that her death resulted from it, others, like the man Murphy, who was convicted at the Surrey Sessions of stealing a few pieces of indiarubber, were sentenced to 10 years' penal servitude. A man met a woman in the street, struck her a violent blow in the face, knocked out four of her front teeth, loosened the remainder, and cut her lip in two. He was sentenced to two months' imprisonment, the magistrate observing that the sentence ought to be more severe. He had taken these few cases out of the papers since he asked the right hon. and learned Gentleman a Question on the subject, and he had no doubt he might have found hundreds of similar cases. There was no person in any class of society who did not admit that there was in this country an undue tendency to punish the smallest possible offences against property, and, comparatively speaking, almost to ignore offences against the person. He knew the Home Secretary would tell him he had no power to revise sentences. He had no doubt that if the right hon. and learned Gentleman would say that in the one class of cases the sentences were too severe and in the other were not severe enough, that would have considerable influence on the Judges. At any rate, he did his duty in bringing these cases before the House. A man of the name of Harcourt—he begged the right hon. and learned Gentleman's pardon, William Harcourt—was charged with having beaten a woman in a most unmerciful manner. His plea was that that he did not know he had struck her—that was to say, he was in a state of brutal intoxication at the time. The magistrate sentenced him to a month's hard labour. But if that man 1002 had put this hand into her pocket and had taken 6d., he would probably have been sentenced for some years to penal servitude. The hon. Gentleman concluded by moving the Resolution of which he had given Notice.

§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT

said, he must point out to the House that the Motion which they were asked to accept was of a very grave character. It was not an impeachment of particular decisions into which that House certainly could not enter with advantage, but it was a general charge against the administration of the law in cases of outrage, which the hon. Member asserted to have been long a reproach to our Criminal Courts. In this Motion the hon. Member included the whole of the magistrates of this country, from the Chief Justice down to the borough and county Justices. He must point out that those magistrates came from the same class as hon. Members themselves, and were members of the same community; and he would ask the hon. Member how he could account for the fact that many hundreds, he might almost say thousands, of persons having the same feelings of humanity, the same sense of right and wrong as himself, should have all conspired together habitually to do that which was injurious to the society in which they lived? The thing was improbable on the face of it. It was certainly contrary to his experience and conviction. He could not believe that the Chief Justice and the whole Bench of Judges—["No, no!"]—yes that was the hon. Member's proposition. He could not read it in any other sense, for 1003 the Motion said the administration of the law had been long a reproach to our Criminal Courts, and the hon. Member had started his illustrations with a case in which the Lord Chief Justice was the Judge, and descended to cases in police courts. He could not regard the Motion or the speech of the hon. Member otherwise than as a general indictment and impeachment of the administration of the Criminal Law in all its branches. If the hon. Member had had the same experience as he (Sir William Harcourt) was obliged to have of the reports which went forth to the public of these cases, he would know how extremely inaccurate those reports were, and how much they led to prejudice. Half the work in his office consisted in writing to inquire, either at the instance of other people or on his own motion, for explanations of reports in which improper sentences were alleged to have been given, and in 99 cases out of 100 he found that the report of those cases omitted to notice the material particulars on which the sentences were based. Why they were to assume that a magistrate or Judge whom they had every right to suppose was as fit to form a judgment as they themselves were, should have gratuitously come to a foolish and ridiculous conclusion, disadvantageous to society, he could not understand. His official experience showed that in 99 cases out of 100, popular prejudice on the matter was not well-founded, because it rested on reports which did not accurately convey the condition of things on which the magistrate had acted. He did not mean to say that there were not occasional cases in which sentences were imposed which he could not approve of, or, at all events, different from what he himself would have imposed; but it must be borne in mind that that was the greatest and insoluble difficulty in the administration of the Criminal Law. The hon. Member had complained of inequality in sentences. There was great inequality of sentences. There must be inequality in sentences as long as we found sentiment varied; and he did not see, unless they could secure uniformity in the temperament of the human mind, that we could ever get that uniformity of sentences which the hon. Member desired. He had no doubt the hon. Member and himself would claim for themselves sentiments of equal rectitude and benevolence; 1004 but it was quite possible that in judging of the same case, with the most honest intent, they would pronounce very different sentences. That always must be so. They never could, by Act of Parliament, settle absolute sentences. All they could do by statute was to fix the maximum sentences; but between the maximum and minimum there would always be immense room for diversity of feeling and judgment on the part of the magistrates who administered the law. He was quite conscious of that, and could see no remedy for it. The hon. Member had complained that there was a broad distinction between the manner of dealing with offences against the person and offences against property. One fact, which did not solve all the cases, but which had a bearing on them, was this. They often saw what seemed to be a very small offence against property visited with a very heavy sentence, but newspaper reports almost universally omitted the circumstances, that it might be the sixth, seventh, or tenth conviction. People saw that a man had been punished for larceny with, say, five years' penal servitude; but they did not know the fact that that man was a confirmed offender, whereas in these cases of personal outrage, however brutal, they were more commonly than not first offences, a circumstance which very often accounted for the variety of sentences. Those were some of the difficulties which surrounded that matter. He had no objection whatever to the hon. Member discussing it. It was very useful and wholesome that sentences should be canvassed and considered by public opinion with a full knowledge of the facts. He felt sure, however, the House would not accept or endorse the general and severe condemnation of the magistrates of this country contained in the Resolution. If that Resolution were well-grounded they ought to dismiss all their magistrates and Judges. He knew no other remedy, because if for years those magistrates and Judges had been acting in a manner which was a reproach to the Criminal Courts, the only cure was to get rid of them. The House could not properly review the decisions of Judges without informing themselves of all the circumstances, and hearing the Judges' explanation of the reasons which induced them to pass the sentences complained of.