The International Abolitionist Federation (IAF; ), founded in Liverpool in 1875, aimed to abolish state regulation of prostitution and fought the international traffic in women in prostitution. It was originally called the British and Continental Federation for the Abolition of Prostitution.
The federation was active in Europe, the Americas, and the European colonies and mandated territories. It felt that state regulations encouraged prostitution while having the effect of enslaving women in prostitution. It felt that the solution lay in moral education, empowerment of women through the right to acquire skills and work, and marriage. The federation experienced opposition from the authorities in Europe and the colonies, who were unwilling to relinquish control, and from reformers who wanted to suppress traffic of women but were less concerned with their welfare. After World War I (1914–18), the IAF was involved in discussions about League of Nations conventions on the issues, and after World War II (1939–45), about United Nations conventions. In later years, the main focus was on eliminating unjust regulations that violated women's rights.
Background
The Regulation System of prostitution in the 19th century typically consisted of policing, brothel licenses, red light districts, registration and forced medical examination of women in prostitution, and forced hospitalization of women in prostitution suffering from sexually transmitted diseases. Abuses included police corruption, registration of underage girls, forced registration of vulnerable women, debt bondage and other ways in which women in brothels were exploited, as well as regulations and other practices that prevented women from leaving prostitution. In the colonies and mandated territories, the regulations were often related to military conquest and control.
The English feminist Josephine Butler (1828–1906), who came from a family involved in the abolition of slavery, believed that forced vaginal examination of women suspected of prostitution violated their basic legal rights. She argued that women lacked sexual autonomy because they were excluded from higher education, professional training, and paid employment and therefore had to choose between marriage or prostitution. Either way, their condition was no different from that of a slave. Butler published many articles on the subject. She toured Europe in 1874 and 1875 to raise support for an international abolitionist movement. In Italy she was able to talk with Giuseppe Mazzini and Giuseppe Garibaldi.
Beliefs
Butler and the pastors and friends who joined her at first campaigned for the "freedom and purity of our English Commonwealth", with which they alluded to the liberty of women and to morality and the family. They were against extra-marital sex but also against celibacy, which they felt leads to depravity. The solution was marriage. In 1882, Butler said, "The best of the restrictions imposed by law is that which encourages and, if necessary, forces citizens of both sexes to practice self-respect."
The abolition campaign rested on two main arguments. The first was "scientific evidence" that state regulation was ineffective and even harmful. The second was that regulation was unacceptable even it were effective in terms of administration and health because it violated human liberty. The abolitionists supported the civil rights of women in prostitution and denied that the state had the right to organize prostitution. Abolitionists were against the abuses inherent in state regulations and against restrictions on the basic freedoms of women in prostitution, such as their right to freedom of movement and to voluntary medical examination. Butler asserted that regulation deprived women of the rights bestowed by Magna Carta and the writ of habeas corpus.
The abolitionists pointed out the double standard of contemporary sexual morality due to which women's bodies were policed and controlled but their male customers were not regulated. They pointed out that this resulted in a double injustice "because it is unjust to punish the sex who are the victims of a vice, and leave unpunished the sex who are the main cause both of its vice and its dreaded consequences". Men both caused prostitution and enforced the system that shamed and punished the women who were its victims. The IAF said, "The social rehabilitation of prostitutes cannot solve the problem of prostitution unless other factors influence the causes of prostitution ... Too often prostitutes are subjected to a disguised form of imprisonment, on the pretext of rehabilitation, in spite of laws which do not state prostitution to be an offence." The IAF felt that treating prostitution as a legal or tolerated institution was "a hygienic mistake, a social injustice, a moral outrage, and a judicial crime".
The abolitionists also thought the trafficking of women would be reduced by the abolition of state-regulated prostitution. They were uneasy about cooperating on measures against the white slave traffic with governments that regulated prostitution because they saw the governments as hypocritical in maintaining a system that created demand for the trafficked women.
In the late 19th century, most IAF activists did not have the right to vote because women's suffrage only existed in very few countries. They faced disapproval of open discussion of sexual matters by women. Their efforts to organize were sometimes countered by police repression. The movement struggled to maintain coherence despite the different priorities and beliefs of its members and despite the continued expansion of the colonial and imperial system. The IAF tried to be independent of any particular political, philosophical, religious, or ethnic ties but was in practice dominated by Europeans. The federation often looked to socialists for support, stressing the economic causes of prostitution among women unable to find other employment.
International meetings
Various groups in different countries agitated against sexual slavery in the 1870s. They formed an international federation thanks to the activity of Josephine Butler and a few other feminist leaders. The first meeting of the British branch was held in Liverpool in March 1875 and was attended by Italian representatives. The movement soon spread to other European countries, to European colonies or client states (India, Egypt, and the Dutch East Indies), and to the Americas. A pan-European international congress with six or seven hundred attendees was held in Geneva from 17 to 22 September 1877. The British, Continental, and General Federation for the Abolition of the Government Regulation of Vice was established at this meeting.
The supporters of the federation included a range of women including doctors, religious reformers, and feminists who were also active in organizations such as the International Council of Women and the International Woman Suffrage Alliance. The federation was also supported by liberal or socialist men. It was one of the first unofficial international societies for social and legal reform. The resolutions stressed the importance of self-control, denied that debauchery was inevitable, decried impurity in both men and women, and called for the police to ensure that decency be respected in the street. They also said that "[c]ompulsory registration is an affront to liberty and to common law". There was thus tension between the disapproval of extramarital relations and the demand for women's liberty. The International Union of Friends of Young Women was founded at this congress. This was a Protestant association that gave assistance to emigrating girls and women in an effort to prevent their sexual exploitation.
The federation helped the national abolitionist organizations to communicate and make connections, but activity at the international level was difficult due to the profound differences between the different countries. These included "[t]he differences of language, of national and social traditions, of the state of public opinion and of the laws—and above all, the differences in the status of women". At the international level, the focus had to be strictly on the repeal of state laws and regulations regarding prostitution.
The first annual conference of the federation was held in Paris from 24 to 25 September 1878 in a mood of optimism. James Stansfeld (1820–1898), the general secretary, had been received by Émile Deshayes de Marcère, the French minister of the interior. The second congress of the federation, held in Genoa from 27 September to 4 October 1880, was attended by Yves Guyot and Emilie and Auguste de Morsier. The resolutions of this congress show that the liberal position had triumphed. There was no mention of repression of illicit sexuality, only demands for guarantees of individual liberty, the rule of law, and the abolition of the regulation of prostitution. The British, Continental, and General Federation for the Abolition of Regulated Prostitution held its fifth conference in Geneva in 1889, where it solemnly denounced the international white slave trade. The federation moved its headquarters to Geneva in 1898. It became the International Abolitionist Federation in 1902.
Local abolitionist movements
Britain
In the 1870s Butler helped organize the Ladies National Association for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts. The Contagious Diseases Acts had extended British regulations of women in prostitution in military areas to cover the whole country. The British, Continental and General Federation for the Abolition of Government Regulation of Prostitution: British Branch was formed in Liverpool on 19 March 1875. The reformers used the name "abolition" as a reference to the earlier movement to abolish slavery, since they considered that state-regulated prostitution was a form of slavery of women. The British branch was based in Liverpool and had an office in Westminster, London. James Stansfeld was president, Josephine Butler secretary and Henry Wilson corresponding secretary. Later William Crosfield was made treasurer and James Stuart replaced Wilson.
The British association saw prostitution as part of the larger issue of social morality and the position of women. Butler was also active in the suffrage movement. The concept that regulation was acceptable in the colonies but not in Europe was completely rejected since the arguments against regulation were considered to be based on universal principles. British reformers also worked in Australia, Ceylon, Gibraltar, Hong Kong, India, Malta, Singapore and South Africa. In 1886 the British Contagious Diseases Act was repealed, a victory for the abolitionists. This was followed by a large meeting to which delegates came from Europe and America to "consolidate the attack on regulation throughout the world".
After the Contagious Diseases Acts were repealed the branch concentrated on eliminating regulation of prostitution in the British Empire, and in India in particular. In 1890 it changed its name to the British Committee for the Abolition of the State Regulation of Vice in India and throughout the British Dominions. In 1897 the branch re-launched the Shield, a periodical that had supported repeal of the Contagious Diseases Act, after this act was re-enacted in India. In 1915 the branch merged with the Ladies National Association for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts to form the Association for Moral and Social Hygiene (AMSH). The international abolitionist Alison Neilans (1884–1942) was the AMSH general secretary in the 1920s. The AMSH was a member of the IAF.
Netherlands