Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 13 Mar 1924

Vol. 6 No. 27

DÁIL IN COMMITTEE. - JURIES AMENDMENT BILL, 1924.

SECTION I.

(3) All the provisions of the Electoral Act, 1923, in relation to claims to be entered in the register and in relation to objections to the electors lists shall (save as otherwise provided by this Act) apply to the matters required by this Act to be included in the register and in the electors lists respectively in like manner as those provisions apply to the matters required by the Electoral Act, 1923, to be included in the register and electors lists respectively.

(5) This section shall not apply to a university constituency or to the registration officer, register of electors, or electors lists for such constituency.

Mr. DUGGAN

I beg to move the following amendment:—

1. In sub-section (3), line 26, to delete the words "and in relation to" and to insert a comma in lieu thereof, and in line 27 to insert after the word "lists" the words "and correction of the electors lists."

The object of the amendment is to remove any possible doubt as to the returning officer's power to change the marking in the Jurors' columns if he is satisfied that those markings are wrong. Under the Section as it stands it may be argued that there was no power to mark A. B. as liable to jury service or to mark A. B. as not liable to such service. This gives him power to alter the marking once it is made.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Mr. JOHNSON

I beg to move the following amendment:—

"To delete sub-section (5) and to substitute in lieu thereof as follows:—

"(5) This Section shall apply to electors for a University constituency subject to the modification that the registration officer, register of electors and electors' lists shall be those relating to the constituencies in which such persons would have been registered if they had not chosen to be registered for a University constituency."

This amendment is put forward with the desire to be quite sure that University electors will not be able to get out of their liability to jury service by allowing themselves to be placed on a University register and not to be on any Local Government register. I put it forward because I want to have the Minister's views as to whether there is any risk of University electors evading that responsibility.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

There is no such risk. The Deputy, in forming that conclusion or that suspicion, seems to overlook the existence of a Local Government elector as distinct from a Parliamentary voter. A juror may be defined roughly as a Local Government voter whose premises have a sufficiently high valuation. To have premises of such value rated in one's name in a county is what makes a person a juror. Take this case as an example. A University elector has premises rated in his own name in the city of Dublin. His name appears as a Local Government elector in the city of Dublin electorate, and he will be marked in this list as a juror for the city unless exempted for some other reason. If he is not a Local Government voter he cannot possibly be a juror at all because he has not the necessary rateable qualifications. The point raised by the Deputy is already covered by the Bill, and until we alter the law as regards the qualifications for jury service and these qualifications are not altered by the Bill, the whole law on the subject may be summed up by saying that in each county each person with the necessary amount of land or property rated in his name should be returned as a juror. The provision of the Bill effects this adequately without the amendment which stands in the Deputy's name. The official who makes up the jury book in each county has before him a complete list of each Local Government elector in the county. He takes out all the occupied premises with the necessary valuation, and whether they happen to be University electors or not makes no difference whatever. The point which the Deputy raises has been looked into very carefully, and I can give him an official assurance that University electors under this Bill or the existing law do not escape liability for jury service.

Mr. JOHNSON

Will the Minister give us the same assurance that if the University elector escapes being put upon the Local Government register he may thereby escape jury service.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

He will.

Mr. ALTON

I do not want Deputy Johnson to spread the scandal that University electors wish to escape jury service more than any other citizens. I have had such summonses. I confess that I have pleaded exemption on very good grounds, but we are willing to do our duty as citizens, in fact more willing than electors of many other constituencies. I would like Deputy Johnson to fling his thunder-bolts at some other section of the community.

Mr. JOHNSON

I gather that the effect of this Section will be that the conditions of being required to serve on a jury will be that the intended jurors will be on the register of electors. The bargain may be struck that it is cheaply bought to lose the vote in exchange for losing the liability for jury service. Once you let that go abroad you will give an inducement to those people who do not want to get on to the jury list to avoid being placed upon the electors' list. After all, the chance of voting in the South Dublin election once a year is not so ardently desired by people who are liable to be called to serve on juries. I think they would reckon that they would be getting off cheaply if they could get an exemption from jury service at the cost of losing their right to vote. That is a consideration I wanted some assurance on.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

University electors would have no right to vote in South Dublin.

Mr. JOHNSON

If he is resident in South Dublin he may be voting in the local elections. I spoke of South Dublin because South Dublin is topical, and I suppose the result of to-day has rather affected one's view of those things. The local government electors and the Parliamentary electors are to be on one list. I think you will find, as a result of this Act, that there will be a desire—shall I say, a conspiracy? —to get away from the responsibility of jury service at the price of being deprived of their votes.

Amendment put and declared lost.

Question: "That Sections 1 and 2 stand part of the Bill," put and agreed to.

SECTION 3.

(1) Every woman to whom this Section applies who is qualified and liable to serve as a juror in any administrative county or county borough shall be entitled, if she so desires, to be exempted from serving as such juror, and shall be entitled, if she so desires, to be entered in the register of electors for the registration area comprising such administrative county or county borough as exempt from serving as a juror.

(2) This Section applies to unmarried women and to widows, and also to married women whose husbands are qualified and liable to serve as jurors in the same administrative county or county borough as that in which such women are themselves so qualified and liable.

Mr. JOHNSON

I beg to move:—

In sub-section (1) to delete the word "woman" in line 1 and to substitute therefor the word "person" and to delete the word "she" in lines 3 and 5 and to substitute therefor in each case the word "he."

The amendment is to alter the word "woman" to "person." It is proposed in response to what I might call the spirit of the age, which desires to see equal rights and equal responsibilities in matters of citizenship for men and women, and that we shall not ask women to exempt themselves unless we ask men to exempt themselves on the same terms. The Section provides for certain women being exempted from serving as jurors. I am asking the Section to be altered to read that every person to whom this Section applies who is qualified and liable to serve as a juror in any administrative county or county borough, shall be entitled, if he so desire—and "he" includes "she"— to be exempted from serving as such juror, and shall be entitled, if he so desires, to be entered on the Register of Electors as exempt from serving as a juror. It is a claim for the equality of the sexes, and is inserted with a desire to fulfil Article 3 of the Constitution. We have laid it down from the beginning that we shall treat men and women equally in matters of citizenship. Article 3 of the Constitution says that every person, without distinction of sex, fulfilling certain conditions, shall enjoy the privileges and be subject to the obligations of such citizenship. There is a distinct bond there that there shall be equal obligations, equal rights and responsibilities, and so far as citizenship goes, I do not think we should make a distinction between woman as woman and man as man. If we later come to say that a woman of a certain class, with certain responsibilities, should be exempted, that is one thing. Men have similar responsibilities. They should be exempted too. I do not think we should exempt them because of their sex. Therefore I move this amendment.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

There is a perfectly honest difference of opinion on this matter, but I am very well satisfied that a majority opinion in the country would favour my view rather than that put forward by Deputy Johnson. The effect of the amendment is to limit exemption on request. The Deputy knows that under the existing law this liability is, in fact, evaded, and evaded with the full consent and full approval of nine persons out of ten. He thinks that is wrong. He puts forward abstract principles about the equality of the sexes. I admire Deputy Johnson on abstract principles. I admire him more in the afternoon than in the evening, but no matter what abstract principles may be enunciated, there remains the fact that the woman juror has not been an outstanding success, and that this abstract principle has broken down in practice.

Mr. JOHNSON

Has the woman voter been an outstanding success?

Mr. O'HIGGINS

I would not like to pronounce an opinion on it in public. The proposal that we are putting forward is that any woman who has a taste for that service, any woman who wants to serve on juries, is perfectly free to do so, but we do set out to recognise the liberty, the fact that there are a great many women who abhor that service, and we do not propose to drag unwilling women into jury boxes in response to the claims of a certain number of their advanced sisters—a small number. I know that there are a certain number of women who are indignant at this proposal, who resent it almost as a slight on the sex, and who would expect the Government to undertake the very unpleasant task, and what I am sure would be a very difficult task, of rigidly enforcing the responsibility of jury service on thousands, and perhaps tens of thousands, of women who simply loathe the idea of that service. I am not prepared to do that, and I think it is better that the law should be moulded in accordance with facts in recognition of the fact that this service is extremely unpopular with women generally. It is better to have it that way than simply to have the law openly evaded and flouted as it is at the moment. The advanced ladies resent this feature of the Bill. It is open to the advanced ladies to convert their less advanced sisters, but I am not prepared to undertake, in addition to other strenuous duties and responsibilities, the duty of seeing that the existing law with regard to jury service is enforced. I, therefore, suggest to the good sense of Deputies that it needs to be amended, and I put this forward as a practical amendment in accordance with facts which are well known to all of us.

ATTORNEY-GENERAL

Speaking not from any doctrinaire point of view, whether in the one direction or the other, I may say that, during the consideration of the Courts Bill, I received a number of representations and a certain number of deputations from, amongst others, what the Minister for Home Affairs would call, I suppose, advanced ladies—that is to say, societies of women who are interested in political affairs and think about these things perhaps more than their sisters. And on this subject I was surprised that they did put forward this, as I thought, moderate proposition. As a matter of practical affairs, we all know that in the conduct of the courts a great deal of delay and annoyance is caused by the innumerable applications on the part of women to be dispensed from service on juries. We know that there are a great number who are simply frightened out of their lives at the idea of going on juries in a civil or, still worse, in a criminal matter, and as a matter of saving public time it has been thought desirable that there should be some provision to ease that situation until what the Minister calls the advanced ladies have brought the rearguard up to their standard of education in public affairs, and have imbued them with a desire to take part in the duties of citizenship. I discussed this matter with two or three of these deputations, and I understood from them that they would be willing, for the present, at any rate, to have a provision by which only women who applied to be put on jury lists should be put on them. That does not appeal to me, because I think that it would not get the average woman. It is better that you should have as jurors average people, with special exemptions of people, who, by reason of their temperament, their timidity, ought, as a mere matter of practical business, to be exempted from this particular duty in the present state of education and conduct of affairs. This Section as it stands is a nearer approach to the transition stage when one anticipates all women will face this particular ordeal with equanimity, and I submit that this Section as it stands will ease the business of the courts by allowing women to apply at the proper opportunity for exemption in the particular cases mentioned in the Section. It would relieve the courts from having cases for trial held up, and having exhibitions of nerves and what, I suppose, the Minister might call temperament, which are a disturbing factor in the Courts of Justice. For this reason I support the Section as it stands.

Mr. WOLFE

I should like to say a word or two in support of the action of the Minister in resisting this amendment. I think it is a futile thing to think that because women have the vote they can ever be put, in all cases, on equal terms with men. It has never been suggested that they should be asked to serve in the Army. I do not think our Minister for Defence has issued instructions for recruiting amongst the ladies, and hitherto they have not been asked to serve in the Navy, although a few of them have served surreptitiously, and I do not think it has been a great success.

Mr. JOHNSON

Will the Deputy say who is responsible for depriving them of the right of serving in our Navy?

A DEPUTY

The Minister for Defence.

Mr. WOLFE

I do not think they have ever asked for that, but I think that serving on juries is one of these things that might be ranked amongst the things that women might be exempted from, just as they have been exempted, and have not been asked to serve hitherto in the Army or the Navy. I have always been a very strong supporter of women having votes, though I lived in an atmosphere that was hostile to that. I do not think it has ever been sufficiently demonstrated that the majority of women were ever in favour of possessing the vote. We know a great number of them are, and have made themselves heard, but there has never been a referendum taken on the subject in these Islands, and we have never known whether the majority of them wanted to be on the same terms as men or not. That remains a matter of doubt, and I think there is no doubt that a very large number of the women look forward to serving on juries with the utmost dread, and a very large number of them are quite unfitted for it. Those who are fitted for it have the right and can insist on serving, and no doubt in many cases they can be extremely useful, but to insist that every woman, because she has a vote—in many cases against her will—should be compelled to serve on juries is, I think, an outrageous thing. If we knew for certain that the majority of women had asked for those privileges they have got, then we would have every right to insist that in everything they should do as men do. But they never were asked. That being so, I think we have no right whatever to insist on every woman having to serve on a jury, which is repugnant and odious to a very large number of them, and in many cases, as the Attorney-General has mentioned, they are quite hopeless when they come to serve on juries. Therefore, I give my strongest support to the Minister in resisting this amendment.

Mr. JOHNSON

Unfortunately for the Deputy's argument, and even that of the Attorney-General, the Section does not accomplish the end that he seeks, and may I say that this service is odious to men. The very fact that certain exemptions are made—a certain liability is imposed even in this Section on women to serve on juries—is because there is a belief that the men are just as antipathetic to service on juries. I want to disabuse the Dáil of the notion that I am putting forward this amendment in response to any demand from what was called the advanced women. I may be called an anti-feminist in this matter. I am seeking to impose on them an obligation, and not to relieve them of a liability. If they have demanded rights as they have, I say certain responsibilities have to follow those rights, and they had better refuse to go on the voters list if they are not to serve as jurors. Let me point out that this Section applies to unmarried women, and to widows, and also to married women whose husbands are qualified and liable to serve as jurors in the same administrative county or county borough as that in which such women are themselves so qualified and liable. If a married woman's husband is not qualified and liable to serve as a juror, then she is obliged to serve as a juror, and she may not claim exemption, so that the very Section itself is going to impose on women an obligation to serve as jurors, provided they are women whose husbands have found a way of avoiding liability. Therefore the arguments of the Attorney-General, the Minister, and Deputy Woulfe fail when applied to women's repugnance to serving on juries. You are by this very Section imposing on women an obligation to serve on juries, but you are imposing it on them rather as a punishment because their husbands have evaded liability for service. The sins of the husbands shall be visited on the wives. When the Section itself embodies such a principle how can you come and defend the Section on the grounds that you must not impose on women a liability to serve because it is repugnant to them? Let me also point out the weakness of the case again. You are talking about the advanced women; take any hundred women who may be liable to serve as jurors, and ten of them probably are actively interested in political affairs. Those persons will take advantage of the exemption which is provided for them in this Bill. They may be the kind of persons who ought to serve on the jury because of their active interest in public affairs. But they claim exemption, and other people who are not interested, who take no interest in public affairs, and read only the picture papers and the fashion plates do not claim exemption. But because they do not claim exemption, the least capable women for serving on juries are, by the very acceptance of this Section, going to be obliged to serve. I say that is a complete inconsistency, and cannot be justified by the arguments adduced by the Attorney-General, the Minister, and Deputy Woulfe, as you are imposing on a section of women an absolute obligation to serve, notwithstanding your feeling that you should not impose such an obligation, that it is repugnant, and you do that because their husbands have failed in their duty. You impose it upon the wives, but then you invite the active citizens who are just as likely to desire to evade jury service as any active men because of their activity and their knowledge of and interest in public affairs, to apply for exemption. But the other women who are domestic and are not troubled about public affairs will find their names on the jury list, because they did not apply for exemption. Is that the intention of the Minister?

ATTORNEY-GENERAL

I have had experience of a good many mixed juries, and from my observation I can say that the fashion-plate variety of ladies seems to have secured exemption to date. As regards the other observations of Deputy Johnson relating to the question of women whose husbands are qualified and liable, the Section in that branch is drafted in order to prevent evasion. That is to say, the husband and wife, one of whom ought to give service, are not to be allowed to escape. Formerly the man could escape by the wife being the rated occupier. In future under this Section that will become a matter for settlement domestically.

Mr. JOHNSON

It is notorious, as the Attorney-General will recognise with his great experience, that on such matters as this there are very keen divisions of opinion in domestic circles. Contrary to the usual practice of the law in the past, I think we are not going to impose the obligation upon the man, but rather punish the woman for the man's failure to fulfil his obligations. I am not supporting that attitude.

ATTORNEY-GENERAL

Does the Deputy suggest there will be no Nemesis for the man?

Amendment put and negatived.

Mr. DUGGAN

I move:—

In sub-section (1) to delete all from the words "to be exempted" in line 4 to the word "desires" in line 5, and to add after the word "juror" in line 7 the words "and while so entered shall be exempted from so serving."

Deputy Johnson has spoken of the equality of the sexes. In theory I quite agree with everything that he says, but we all know that in practice there is no equality of the sexes, and there never will be. We also know that the normal woman will have no desire or anxiety to serve on a jury, and she never will serve on a jury if she can avoid it.

Mr. JOHNSON

Nor the normal man.

Mr. DUGGAN

The normal man is prepared to accept his responsibility in that respect. I suggest from my own experience, and I have a good deal of experience of jury matters, that the jury box is not the place for the normal woman, and that the normal woman will never find her way into that box if she can help it.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Mr. JOHNSON

I beg to move:—

To delete sub-section (2) and to substitute in lieu thereof as follows:—

(2) This Section applies to women who are mothers of, or responsible for the domestic care of a child or children under the age of sixteen years.

This is an amendment designed to relieve from responsibilities those people who might reasonably be expected to be relieved and whom we should think of as being entitled to relief. That is to say, the Section entitled to be relieved of a liability shall be women who are mothers of, or responsible for, the domestic care of a child or children under the age of sixteen years. If this is carried, it will secure that these people who, it is urged, should be allowed to look after their domestic responsibilities should do so. But it will not relieve the unmarried woman who has not this responsibility, and who is quite capable of serving efficiently as a juror. It will not relieve these women simply because they desire to be relieved. If Deputy Duggan's contention is to be accepted, why does he not move as one of the amendments that no woman shall be allowed to serve on a jury? The Section, as it stands, as I have already said, imposes upon women the obligation of serving on juries. But what class of woman? Those women whose husbands desire to be relieved of the obligation and secure excision from the Jurors' Lists and the Electors' Lists. Then the obligation is imposed upon the woman. You cannot consistently say that women should not be allowed to serve on juries, and put forward a proposition which imposes on them the liability to serve on juries, provided their husbands have done certain things or failed to do certain things. I want to exempt from liability the mothers of children, and those who have the care of children, and unless you are going absolutely to remove women from the obligation and alter the law with respect to women, then I can understand your argument. I take it this is implied; the woman that will want to serve on juries will be a particular type of woman and you are going to put them upon the list. Are they going to make efficient jurors?

Will Deputy Duggan say that his experience is that that particular type of person is going to make an efficient juror? Is that particular type of woman going to conform to the theory of the jury system that the even citizen, the peers of the prisoner or the disputant shall decide the case? You are practically saying that the neurotic women shall serve on juries because they may desire to serve on juries, and you are going to leave to that particular type of women the responsibility for deciding very grave issues. I say they are not the type of women that you should urge or even allow to serve on juries to the exclusion of normal women. I am asking, in this amendment, that women who are mothers of children shall be exempted, but so long as you are inviting women and making provision for women to serve on juries, I submit that it is not good policy to leave that service to those who specifically express their desire on the one hand, or who are negligent of their rights of exemption. You will, under the Section as it stands, impose upon certain women the obligation. You will allow the keen public woman who is capable and efficient and aware of her rights and public interests, but is not desirous of serving the public interest. She will claim exemption and leave on the list the careless and those who specifically desire to serve. No, I say that is not fulfilling the intention of the jury system which provides for a case being tried by the average man. You are selecting women, and that, I think, is not serving the intentions, and I suggest that the whole question should be reconsidered.

Mr. O'HIGGINS

I think the Deputy's case breaks down when he remembers that the positive act of seeking exemption is necessary in order to secure exemption, that the ordinary course is that women serve equally with men on juries. To meet the case of sensitive nervous women with a positive reluctance and a distaste for this service, we are saying that the women who seek exemption, who take the positive step of seeking exemption, shall automatically secure that exemption. Now, the Deputy says we are making one class of women liable. We inserted the provision to meet the case of a man desiring to evade jury service, getting his property rated in his wife's name, and we say that in a case of that kind that one or the other of the pair shall be liable for jury service, and that if the man takes a step to get his property rated in the name of his wife with a view to securing exemption from jury service, that the net result of that will be to place liability upon the wife. I rather think if that provision remains in the Bill, and the Bill becomes law, that there will be very few cases of men taking that particular step.

Amendment put and negatived.

AN CEANN COMHAIRLE

Amendment 6 in the name of Deputy Johnson, falls with Amendment 3.

Question: "That Section 3, as amended, stand part of the Bill"—put and agreed to.

Question: "That Sections 4 to 14, inclusive, stand part of the Bill"—put and agreed to.

Question: "That the Schedule stand part of the Bill"—put and agreed to.

Question: "That the title stand part of the Bill"—put and agreed to.

Fourth Stage ordered for Wednesday, 19th March.