§ CAPTAIN DAWSON-DAMERsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether it may not be practicable, and, if possible, in future be expedient in the interest of public morality, to impose some check upon the publication of the proceedings in the Divorce Court?
MR. BRUCESir, the question the hon. and gallant Gentleman now raises was fully considered by this House in the discussions on the Divorce Court in 1859. On the recommendation of the learned and eminent Judge who then presided over that court—Sir Cresswell Cresswell—a clause was introduced in the other House to enable the Judge to hear cases with closed doors; but, after full discussion, that clause was rejected in this House. The principal ground on which the House rejected it was this—that publicity was necessary for the pure and impartial administration of justice, and that, admitting that much misery and occasional mischief might result from the publication of those proceedings, yet, on the whole, public morality rather gained than lost by it.