The Solicitors' Journal and Reporter - March 9, 1912

The latest phase of the militant Suffragist movement has resulted in the infliction of a vast amount of damage upon shopkeepers and insurance companies, who cannot be accused of any active opposition to the claims of their hysterical assailants. To these victims the most interesting question is the frankly material one, whether or not they can get any compensation from the wrongdoers or the public purse. This is not quite so easy a question to decide as it may at first sight appear. Possibly an action for conspiracy against the supposed leader of the movement would secure a verdict for heavy damages against them; but probably the difficulty would arise that the persons sued would be men and women of straw, who would not be worth powder and shot. Since the organization which is credited with responsibility for these acts of violence is not a corporate body, either at common law or under any statute, its funds could not be seized by any process known to the law. Another alternative is to put in force various sections of the Malicious Damage Act, 1861 – the section appropriate varies according to the amount of damage, the nature of the property, and the environing circumstances attending the offence – which enable a magistrate or judge to add an order for compensation to the sentence passed in the case of the actual perpetrators of each act of outrage. But it would seem that £5 is in most cases the limit of compensation allowed by the statute; and probably even this sum could not be recovered from the wrongdoers. A third alternative is to deliver a claim to the Receiver of the Metropolitan Police for compensation under the Riot (Damages) Act, 1886. But such claim arises only when the loss is not covered by insurance, and therefore is not available at all to the insurance companies. Moreover, it depends on the question of fact as to whether or not the conduct of the window-breakers comes within the legal definition of riot; and that is not the easiest of questions to answer with any certainty.

Are the Militant Suffragists Rioters?

It is well-settled law that a riot is the final outcome of conduct which in its earlier stages constitutes two somewhat less serious offences. An unlawful assembly is an assembly of three or more persons for a purpose forbidden by law, with intent to carry out that common purpose in such a manner as to endanger the public peace, or to give firm and courageous persons in the neighbourhood reasonable grounds to apprehend a breach of the peace (Archbold, p. 1214). When the assembly takes some overt step to execute its unlawful purpose, it becomes a rout (Archbold, p. 1216). And when it has actually executed some part of its purpose it becomes a riot. Those three progressive stages in the building up of the offence may be illustrated in this way. A, B, and C meet at A’s house for the purpose of assaulting a cabinet minister; this is an unlawful assembly. They then go to the minister’s house; they are now a rout. Having reached his house they assault him; a riot has now taken place (Stephens’ Digest of the Criminal Law, p. 56). It is only when the final stage has occurred that damages can be claimed under the Riot (Damages) Act, 1886. It will thus be seen that there are five essential elements in the offence of riot: there must be (1) at least three persons, (2) a common purpose, (3) execution or inception of the common purpose, (4) an intent to carry out the common purpose if necessary by force, against any person who may resist it, and (5) force or violence sufficient to alarm persons of reasonable firmness and courage: Field v. Receiver of Metropolitan Police (1907, 2 K.B. 853). The first three elements are obviously present in the case of the Regent Street window-breakers. As regards the fourth there is, perhaps, some doubt. It might be contended that those who took part in the outrages intended merely to injure property, and did not propose to employ force against persons resisting them. Probably the answer is that the employment of stones and hammers to break the windows of crowded shops, in reckless disregard of the possible injury that the falling glass might do to their inmates, is a sufficient indication of an intention to use force in order to accomplish their purpose. The fifth element, the causing of alarm, is probably proved by the action of the shopkeepers in closing their shops and putting up shutters, as well as by the decision of responsible persons to close various museums and public buildings until the present reign of terror has been ended. But the law of riot is little elucidated by decisions, and attempts to proceed under it, either by way of criminal proceedings or civil suit, would have many ingenious technical objections to encounter.