MERCY FOR THIS MOTHER! cried London's Daily Sketch. Seldom, said Lord Beaverbrook's Evening Standard, has there been a more striking example of "how the law, when administered with insufficient humanity, can not only condone injustice but actively inflict it." Seldom, either, had Britain as a whole been more concerned over the strange workings of some of its quainter laws.
The latest shocking example of Britain's inhumane laws involved Eftihia Christos, a 39-year-old Greek Cypriot who came to Britain 20 years ago. In 1953, after her husband died of tuberculosis, Eftihia got an allowance from the National Assistance Board, but it was...