World: The Right to Advertise

Model Susan, 40-28-40, full personal service and corrective treatment. Hours 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Such notices have proliferated in the windows of London tobacconists and newsdealers ever since the 1959 Street Offenses Act drove Britain’s prostitutes off the streets by making public “soliciting” illegal. Neatly written on white cardboard, most of the ads are suggestively worded (“Learn the twist”; “Private lesson in physical culture”), and all include a telephone number. In a move to curb such advertising, the government last year convicted the London tobacconist who displayed Susan’s notice for helping her solicit customers. But last week the Court of Appeal reversed the conviction, ruled that posting the ads was not “soliciting” in the normal sense of the word. Furthermore, the court decided that, since the Street Offenses Act was meant only to clear the streets of prostitutes and not to ban prostitution, the government was extending the meaning of the bill too far.