The Famous 5 and the Infamous Lizzie

De l’oreille gauche tried to hide the scepticism in his voice ring his own theory. “Okay, let’s get when he asked, “What’s so interesting?” back to morning report,” he said, head- All forgiveness The physician pointed at the bed. ing back to the doctor’s lounge. The in- “How’d he fall out with the rails up?” terns followed dutifully. Confession of our faults is the next thing The resident, annoyed with himself The attending physician stood there to innocence. for missing such an obvious detail, a moment, watching the sun’s red ascent — Publius Syrus, maxim 1060 thought for a moment, then smiled and and trying to recall something. It was waved his hand dismissively. “I’ll tell Martin Heidegger, wasn’t it, who had The art of confession has an you what happened.” Then, sotto voce said that man could not postpone his illustrious history: think of so that the nurse in attendance could concern about death, but must be con- St. Augustine and Rousseau. not hear (there was no use making ene- cerned with it always? Yet it never A fault admitted is more mies), “Someone forgot to put the rail ceased to amaze him how these young readily forgiven than a fault up last night, and so her friend here did doctors, surrounded as they were by denied. And sometimes it for her before she called us.” Then, death, could be so unconcerned about it. there’s a good story in it. shrugging, “Alas, the horse was already Or about sunrises. The Left Atrium welcomes out of the barn.” short poems and prose “Or maybe,” one of the interns of- Frederick Paola submissions of up to 1000 fered hesitantly, “he climbed over the Assistant Professor of Medicine words. Confide in us at rail and slipped during the night?” University of South Florida College of [email protected] “Maybe,” the resident reluctantly Medicine admitted after a pause, clearly prefer- Tampa, Fla. Lifeworks The Famous 5 and the infamous Lizzie iving tree. Any law student worth women in the governance of our soci- 20th century, prostitution was con- L his or her salt instantly identifies ety. In the words of Emily Murphy, one trolled primarily by vagrancy laws. So- these two words with Edwards v. A.G. of of the “Famous 5” who brought the cietal prejudices that laid the blame at Canada,1 more commonly known as the case before the courts, “We, and the the feet of the prostitutes, combined “Persons” case. This 1929 ruling over- women of Canada whom we had the with the rising fear of the spread of turned an earlier decision of the high honour to represent, are not con- venereal disease, caused Lizzie to re- Supreme Court of Canada that the pro- sidering the pronouncement of stand- ceive harsh treatment at the hands of visions of the British North America Act ing as a sex victory, but rather, as one Jamieson, the second female magistrate for the appointment of “qualified per- which will permit our saying ‘we’ in- to be appointed in the British Empire. sons” to the Canadian Senate did not stead of ‘you’ in affairs of State.”3 David Bright observes that “an endur- include women. In those days our high- In reaching their decision the British ing sexual discrimination existed at the est court of appeal was the Judicial law lords reviewed external evidence core of legislative measures — regula- Committee of the British Privy Coun- such as case law and other legal prece- tion, prohibition and rehabilitation — cil; and so it was that a British court, dents, and in so doing acknowledged adopted by the state to combat prosti- not a Canadian one, opened the doors and gave further validity to the chang- tution.”4 In reviewing Jamieson’s han- of our Senate to women. ing role of women in Canadian society. dling of the case, Bright concludes that Law students are taught that the But the history of this case, fraught she acted prematurely and unfairly in “Persons” case marked a turning-point with many interesting twists and turns, handing down an sentence of six in the development of Canadian consti- is also telling. Consider one of the months’ hard labour without allowing tutional law. It gave new meaning to items of external evidence reviewed by the defence to present its case. the term “responsible government” by the Privy Council, the case of Lizzie Cyr’s lawyer appealed the case on a ruling that the BNA Act was to be inter- Cyr. number of grounds, one of which was preted progressively, like a “living tree Lizzie Cyr was a prostitute who in that Jamieson, as a woman, did not have … capable of growth and expansion.”2 1917 was brought before magistrate the legal capacity to hold the public of- And so, in keeping with the times, the Alice Jamieson, in Calgary, on a charge fice of magistrate. The Alberta Court of Act could now be read as including of vagrancy. In the early decades of the Appeal addressed this argument head 1026 JAMC • 17 OCT. 2000; 163 (8).

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