SUFFRAGISTS.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 252, 17 July 1908, Page 7

SUFFRAGISTS.

THEIR LOT IN GAOL. PLACED IN THE SECOND DIVISION. NOT A CASE FOR MERCY. (BT TELEGIUFH—HtESS ASSOCIATION —COPYRIGHT,) (Rec, July 16, 10.50 p.m.) London, July 16. In tho Houso of Commons, Mr. Gladstone (Homo Secretary), in reply to a, question of Mr. J. G, S. MaqNcill (Nationalist member for South Donegal), stated that the imprisoned, sulfragists aro in the second division Mid are on the same diet as persons in tho lirst division, They arc in separate confinement for 22J hours out of the twentyfour. Any suffragist, said Mr. Gladstone, could secure her releaso by giving security for her good behaviour, lie was unable to recommend exercise of the prerogative of mercy. The Minister added, in reply to Mr. W, Redmond (Nationalist member for Kast Clare), that suffragists when taking exercise wero kept apart from ordinary criminals. A QUESTION IN THE LORDS, •: The difference between the treatment accorded to prisoners who are' placed in ' the first-class and those placed in the second .was furnished to tho House of Lords in a question asked by Earl Russell of the- Government concerning the treatment of some ladies. who were undergoing. imprisonment in Holloway Gaol early in tho year becauso they, following on persistent' ringing of the bells of' Cabinet Ministers" houses who refused to .he interviewed, wore sent to prison in default of finding sureties to bo of good behaviour.. Hitherto, Lord Russell said, ladies who had acted in a similar manner had been treated as first-class misdemeanants, ' but now they woro treated as second-class. In the instance under notico the ladies, many of whom were persons of culture and refinement, were placed in the second division, in whioh they.had to wear the ordinary prison clothes brought'out of the jumble store of the gaol; they wore served with tho ordinary food in the ordinary wooden vessels; they vforfe obliged to eat with the ordinary wooden spoons, and they were subject, so far as confinement and exercise went, to all tho other hardships and degradations to which any ordinary prisoner was exposed. In the first _ division prisoners wero enabled ■ to wear their own clothes and have their own. food, and could be supplied with newspapers and books frjm tho outside world; they wure merely confined in prison, without having inflicted upon them any particular hardship or degradation. ■ • Lord Beaucliarap, on behalf of the Government, explained that tho division, in which a prisoner was placed was, by the law, determined by the Magistrate. The ladies referred to in tho question committed an offence against the ordinary law, and the Home Secretary saw no reason to interforo with tho Magistrate's decision'.that thoy. should be placed in tho seoond dlvisian. ,