Edward Brongersma

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Edward Brongersma (August 31, 1911 – April 22, 1998) was a doctor of law and politician. He was for a number of years a member of the Dutch Eerste Kamer ("First Chamber" or Senate) for the Labour Party, and chairman of the Eerste Kamer's Judiciary Committee (1969–1977). He was primarily known as a defender of the rights of paedophiles and an advocate of more liberal legislation on public morality.

1 Life
2 Work
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Life

Edward Brongersma was born in Haarlem as the son of an ophthalmologist. He studied law at the University of Amsterdam (1931-1935) and obtained his degree in 1935. From 1935 to 1937 he was associated with a law firm in Haarlem while working on his doctoral dissertation on the Portuguese constitution of 1933 and Portuguese corporatism of Antonio de Oliveira Salazar, who he much admired at the time. In 1940 he received his Doctor of Law degree cum laude from the Catholic University of Nijmegen. His dissertation, on the subject of the corporative state, was published as a book and was reprinted several times.

After World War II he quickly made a career for himself as a lawyer and politician as well as a prolific writer. He worked as an attorney in Amsterdam from 1940 to 1950, and between 1946 and 1950 he was on the editorial board of the Dutch journal for the legal profession, Nederlands Juristenblad. In 1946 he was elected to the Upper House of Dutch Parliament for the Dutch Labour Party PvdA (his term lasted from 1946 to 1950, later he had a second term, from 1963 to 1977). In the same period (1946-1950) he was a PvdA member of the Provincial States of North Holland and served on the town council of Heemstede.

His career was abruptly interrupted in 1950 when he was arrested for having sexual relations with a young male friend of his who was around 17 years old at the time (born in 1932 or 1933). At the time the age of consent for homosexual contacts was 21, based on an archaic and discriminatory article in the Dutch Civil Code (248a). Brongersma was convicted and spent 11 month in prison. This article was repealed in 1971 and the age of consent was lowered to 16.

He subsequently continued his career in the nineteen fifties as a journalist and critical writer. From 1953 to 1956 he was a member of the executive committee of the Dutch Labour Party in the Utrecht region. In 1956 he started on a four-year term as director of community work in Haarlem. As a result of his conviction he had been disbarred in 1950, but he was re-admitted to the Dutch Bar in 1959. He resumed his legal practice in that year and continued to work as a lawyer until 1980.

From 1960 to 1967 he was a senior lecturer at the Criminological Institute of Utrecht University, where he worked very closely with well-known Professor W. Pompe, who also held a degree in law. In 1963, at the request of the Dutch Labour Party, he rejoined the Upper House for a second term which would last until his resignation in 1977. From 1969 to 1977 he was chairman and spokesman for the Permanent Committee for Justice of the Upper House. For his distinguished political service, he was made a Companion in the Order of the Dutch Lion on 29 April 1975.

Dr Brongersma was primarily known for his publications and his advocacy of more liberal morality legislation, a subject in which he was keenly interested. Because of his great expertise, he played a major role as a member of the Upper House in abolishing Article 248a of the Dutch Civil Code. The age of consent for homosexual contacts was then lowered from 21 to 16. He advocated lowering the age of consent even further and allowing young people greater freedom to enter sexual relations.

In the course of his lifetime he collected a large number of scientific and academic publications on these themes, consisting of a library and archives. In 1979 he donated them to a foundation bearing his name, the object of which as stated in its articles of association was "promoting scientific study and publications in the field of sexual relations between adults and young people". In 1992 the objective was broadened to "promoting research of the sexual-emotional health of children and young people". A great deal of commotion ensued following his death in 1998 when some of the visual material in his collections was seized. The images were deemed to be child pornography. Legislation passed in 1996 made it an offence to have such pictures "on hand".

After resigning from the Dutch Senate in 1977, Brongersma devoted himself completely to the objective of his foundation. It was then that he wrote his magnum opus "Loving Boys" (published in two parts, 1987 and 1990), while continuing to expand his collections. After his death, his entire social-sexuoligical collections as well as his private archives were placed in the International Institute for Social History (IISG) in Amsterdam. The executive board of the foundation continued its activities, changing its name in 2003 into "Fund for Scientific Research of Sexuality (www.fondsseksualiteit.nl).

Dr Brongersma died in 1998 by means of euthanasia, because he felt he had lived his lfe. His health failed and he grew lonely as his best friends passed away one by one. The social changes that had started in the nineteen eighties, in response to the sexual revolution of the seventies, caused him to become dispirited. Initially his pleas to liberalise legislation on public morals and the rights of paedophiles had been very positively received both in the Netherlands and internationally. But gradually the social climate became less receptive to this, even turning harsh and hostile. Following his euthanasia, discussion flared up in the Netherlands as to whether people who were weary of life should be allowed to end their lives with the aid of a physician.

[edit] Work

Dr Brongersma had a huge list of publications to his name, having authored some 1200 books and articles between 1940 and 1998 on a wide range of social and philosophical subjects such as criminal law, constitutional law, criminology, philosophy, religion, sexuology, legislation on public morals and literary topics. Able to read ten West-European languages, he has written books on the Civil War in Spain, Portugal and the Portuguese, penal law and social problems. Beginning with his years at the Criminological Institute, he has written extensively in the area of sexuology, especially on pornography, ephebophilia, pedophilia and the age of consent. His books on this subjects include: Das Verfehmte Geschlecht (on boy-love, 1970), Sex en Straf ("Sex and Punishment", 1972), Over pedofielen en kinderlokkers ("On Pedophiles and Child Molesters", 1975), and his last work (his magnum opus) is entitled Loving Boys (two volumes, 1988-1990).

One aspect that is remarkable about Brongersma's works is that he regarded pedophilia as exclusively a same-sex issue.^[1] By this conviction (publicly shared by the national Dutch homosexual organisation COC at least in 1980^[2] ^[3]), other scientists holding this opinion due to meta-analyzes of international data and studies available from Europe and North America while distinguishing between pedophilia and situational offenders include Howells 1981; McConaghy 1993), basing it on an alleged difference other than sex preference between pedophiles and their acts on the one hand and child molesters on the other, Brongersma opposed the other prominent figure of 1970s pedophile emancipation movement in the Netherlands, psychologist Dr. Frits Bernard.