'Outweighing the Public Weal': The Venereal Diseases Debate in South Australia 1915-1920

Abstract

prostitution and venereal diseases were the British Contagious Diseases Acts that operated in parts of Britain and Australia between 1864 until their repeal in 1886. From 1867 the British Contagious Diseases Acts, or rather the controversy surrounding them, at some level or another informed the policy debate in South Australia (SA). Indeed, the acts hung like a black cloud over attempts by South Australia in the early twentieth century to introduce venereal diseases control policy. With a few amendments throughout their period of operation they provided for the prosecution of women perceived to be prostitutes and suspected of suffering from venereal diseases. The acts drew criticism in Britain from liberal reformers such as John Stuart Mill and Josephine Butler almost from the outset. They were thought to be unjust, as they were directed only against women; immoral, because they appeared to condone prostitution; useless, because they failed to serve the purpose for which they were introduced, namely reducing the incidence of venereal diseases among the armed forces; and unconstitutional, because they violated the basic liberties of some English women.2 In the early twentieth century, the dilemma over whether or not to enforce a compulsory system of disease control incited considerable debate among liberal social reformers, the medical profession, public health authorities, and legislators. The nature and content of this debate has been the subject of a large body of work on the social history of venereal diseases, the basic assumption of which is that the control of venereal diseases syphilis, gonorrhoea and soft chancre was a prob-