Fighting the Traffic in Young Girls Part 23

There could be no legitimate excuse for exploiting the white slave trade in the public prints without the definite and sincere purpose of securing practical and substantial protection against this terrible social scourge. Such is as surely the purpose of this article as it has been that of the excellent articles by Hon. Edwin W. Sims which have brought out a vast and interesting volume of correspondence.

Many of these letters have been from fathers and mothers aroused to anxiety about daughters who have been allowed to seek a livelihood in large cities without suitable oversight or protection. In some instances the worst fears of these parents have been, by definite investigation, shown to be all too well founded.

Other letters have come, by the score, from public officials and from public spirited men and women who have at last been stirred to a realization that there is an actual, systematic and widespread traffic in girls as definite, as established, as mercenary and as fiendish as was the African slave trade in its blackest days. And practically all these letters indicate that very few of those who have been finally aroused to the enormity of existing conditions have any clear idea of what should or may be done to protect these daughters of our own people from the ravages of the white slave traders.

A letter from the Mayor of a Connecticut city is typical of the common misconception among cultivated and well informed public officials who have not given the legal phases of the repression of the white slave trade especial and exhaustive study. The Mayor writes:

"I should think that the Federal Government would have to pa.s.s stringent laws providing a heavy penalty for all who are engaged in this business.

The law would then be the same in all states and people could not escape from its provision as they would if the states tried to take up the matter and pa.s.sed conflicting statutes. An organization might secure the pa.s.sage of such an act by the Federal Government, but it hardly seems to me that it is necessary, more than to state the facts, and have the members of congress take immediate action that would put an end to the whole matter."

While it is probably true that the Federal Government has power to prohibit the carrying of women from one state to another for immoral purposes, that power has not yet been specifically established by actual tests in court and is therefore, in a sense, undefined. On the other hand the states, under their police power, have a remedy in their own hands, and it would seem both logical and natural that this power be exercised in the protection of its own homes and daughters. As a matter of fact we have found literally scores of cases, in our investigations relative to the importation from foreign countries of girls destined for immoral houses, where American born girls have been lured or kidnaped from a home in one state and carried to some large city in another state, there to be broken to the life of shame.

The federal investigations in Chicago and other localities have clearly established the fact, that, generally speaking, houses of ill-fame in large cities do not draw their recruits to any great extent from the territory immediately surrounding them; for obvious reasons the white slavers who are the recruiting agents for the vile traffic prefer to work in states more or less distant from the centers to which their victims are destined.

In view of all this it must be clearly apparent that the need of the hour is legislation which will make it as difficult and dangerous for a white slaver to take his victim from one state into another as it is for him to bring a girl from France or Italy or Canada, or any other foreign country, to a house of ill-fame in Chicago or any American city.

Therefore, it is suggested that if each state in the union would pa.s.s and enforce severe and stringent laws against this importation, this terrible traffic would be dealt a blow in its most vulnerable part. Such an enactment might well be worded as follows:

"Whoever shall induce, entice or procure, or attempt to induce, entice or procure, to come into this state, any woman or girl for the purpose of prost.i.tution or concubinage, or for any other immoral purpose, or to enter any house of prost.i.tution in this state, shall, upon conviction, be imprisoned in the penitentiary for a period of not less than one (1) nor more than five (5) years and be fined not more than five thousand ($5,000) dollars."

One of the strangest results brought about by the recent white slave prosecutions in Chicago and the publicity which they have received, has been the astonishment of thousands of persons, as evidenced by letters, at the fact that such a wholesale traffic is actually in existence. But what is still more astounding, not to say discouraging, is the reluctance of the other thousands to believe that many hundreds of men and women are actually engaged in the business of luring girls and women to their destruction, and that this infamous traffic is being carried on in every state of the union every day of the year.

Perhaps the actuality of this awful avocation may be made more clearly apparent to the innocent and unsophisticated doubters whose awakening and moral support is needed, if I cite one or two instances which have come to my personal knowledge within the last few days.

In a comfortable farm home in a state bordering upon Illinois is an uncommonly attractive young girl who has, almost by accident, been delivered from the worst fate which can possibly befall a young woman.

Through secret service operations one of the most dangerous "procurers"

of this country was traced to the home in which this beautiful girl had been adopted as a daughter. The white slaver had already ingratiated himself into her confidence and that of her foster-parents, and arrangements had practically been made by which she was to accompany him to Chicago, where he had a "fine position" awaiting her. If he had not been located and his character made known to the household at the time when this was done, she would now be a white slave in a Chicago den.

Another case which has had a less fortunate termination is that which involves the "fake" marriage, a subterfuge common in this wretched traffic. A young man made the acquaintance of a handsome girl in the North Side district of Chicago. He was polished and plausible and the parents of the girl, who were ambitious for their daughter's advancement, were apparently flattered that he should bestow his attentions upon her. When, after very brief courtship, he proposed marriage, they offered no objections and even set aside their own wishes when he suggested that he held prejudices against being married by a clergyman and against having a formal wedding. Consequently they went before a "Justice of the Peace," who p.r.o.nounced them man and wife--a "fake" Justice, who was merely a confederate of the white slaver. They went at once to San Antonio, Texas, he having claimed that he held a very profitable position in a large business concern in that city. When they arrived there the poor girl had her awful awakening, for she was promptly sold into the life of shame without hope of escape from its degrading servitude.

Another very effective regulation which every state will do well to adopt by enactment of its general a.s.sembly is that making the premises leased or used for a house of ill-fame liable for any and all fines against its lessee.

The following seems to me a desirable clause covering this point:

"Whoever keeps or maintains a house of ill-fame, or a place for the practice of prost.i.tution or lewdness, or whoever patronizes the same, or lets any house, room or other premises for any such purpose, or shall keep a lewd, ill-governed or disorderly house to the encouragement of idleness, gambling, drinking, fornication or other misbehavior, shall be fined not exceeding one thousand ($1,000) dollars. When the lessee or keeper of a dwelling house or other building is convicted under this section the lease or contract for letting the premises shall, at the option of the lessor, become void and the lessor may have like remedy to recover the possession as against a tenant holding over after the expiration of his term. And whoever shall lease any house, room or other premises, in whole or in part, for any of the uses or purposes finable under this section, or knowingly permits the same to be so used or kept, shall be fined not exceeding one thousand ($1,000) dollars and the house or premises so leased, occupied or used shall be held liable for, and may be sold for, any judgment obtained under this section."

Some enactment of this nature is particularly desirable for two reasons: First, because actual experience has shown that judgments obtained against keepers of such houses are difficult of collection and that the ones against whom the judgments are obtained are remarkably resourceful in avoiding punishment even after conviction. Second, it seems obvious that when a property owner knows that his real estate is particularly available for houses of this character he is, if unprincipled enough to do so, bound to encourage the use of his premises for that which will bring him the largest money returns. This puts him in the way of fattening upon the wages of the social vice without incurring danger of punishment. Naturally he becomes a friend of the traffic and ready to aid and abet it wherever and whenever he can. Therefore it seems to me he should no longer be allowed to escape the penalties attached to those who engage in this infamous trade. As the owner of the property on which unlawful acts are persistently committed, and as a sharer in the unlawful profits of those acts, he should be made to share also in its perils and punishments; he should be made to feel that, as the owner of the property used for the purpose of harboring fallen women he is a link in the chain which draws innocent womanhood to its doom and that he must suffer to the full proportion of his guilt. Again, it is the first instinct of the lessee or keeper of such a house, on coming in contact with the law, to flee and forfeit his or her bonds. By making the property itself liable to forfeiture, absolute security against this kind of thing is established, thereby preventing many a miscarriage of justice and of just penalties.

Since the beginning of the recent prosecutions in Chicago a score of keepers, realizing their guilt and fearing prosecution, have fled the country and have not yet been apprehended. If both the federal and the state governments had a law of this kind the escape of these criminals would not have involved a complete defeat of the law in their cases, for prosecution could have been brought against some person connected with their establishments, and when a conviction was secured the property occupied by them could have been closed out. A statute of this kind, wherever enacted, can scarcely fail to prove one of the most powerful and effective of all possible weapons against the white slave traffic.

And the smaller the city, the more effective will this weapon be found--which is only another way of saying that the larger the city the larger the toleration of the social vice.

One of the greatest weapons in the hands of the white slavers and of the keepers of houses of ill-fame to prevent the escape of fresh recruits and to submerge them into hopeless slavery is the system of indebtedness which is practiced in these places. The one object of those concerned in the subjugation of a girl who has become a victim of the wiles of the white slaver is to break down all hope of escape from the life of shame and bitterness into which she has been entrapped. Nothing has been found so effective a means to this end as the debtor system. The first thing a girl is compelled to do on being thrown into one of these houses is to buy an expensive wardrobe at from five to six times its actual value. To be more definite, I have in my possession bills rendered against certain inmates taken from the dens. In these bills stockings costing 75 cents have been charged at $3.00; shoes costing $2.50 are charged at $8.00, and kimonos costing $4.00 are charged at $15.00. As the goods themselves were seized as well as the bills for them, I am able to make this statement. In every case I have found that the girl was compelled to renew her outfit of finery whenever the keeper so dictated, without regard to her need of it. Our investigations have all shown that when a keeper imagined that a girl, an inmate, is intending to leave the place either openly or secretly, a new outfit is forced upon her at absurd figures and she is told that she cannot leave until every cent of her indebtedness has been wiped out, and that if she attempts to do so, they will "put the law on her." In the dozens of cases which I have examined there has not been a single one which has failed to show evidence of this kind. I have in my possession numerous copies of bills rendered against these wretched women in which their costumes reach as high a figure at $1,200 and even $1,500. This indebtedness system is mutually recognized and enforced between the keepers of all houses; in other words, no girl can leave one house and enter another unless she is able to show that she leaves no indebtedness behind her.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HON. CLIFFORD G. ROE]

[Ill.u.s.tration: HON. HARRY A. PARKIN]

As this phase of business in the underworld is one of the main props of white slavery it is well to go into it with definiteness and to give examples which ill.u.s.trates its operation.

In one of the recent raids a big Irish girl was taken and held as a witness. She was old enough, strong enough and wise enough, it seemed to me, to have overcome almost any kind of opposition--even physical violence. She could have put up a fight which few men, no matter how brutal, would care to meet. I asked her why she did not get out of the house, which was one of the worst in Chicago. Her answer was: "Get out--I can't. They make us buy the cheapest rags and they are charged against us at fabulous prices; they make us change outfits at intervals of two or three weeks, until we are so deeply in debt that there is no hope of ever getting out from under. Then, to make such matters worse, we seldom get an accounting oftener than once in six months and sometimes ten months or a year will pa.s.s between settlements--and when we do get an accounting it is always to find ourselves deeper in debt than before. We've simply got to stick and that's all there is to it."

To frame an enactment which will knock this prop of indebtedness system out from under the white slave business might appear to be a most difficult matter, and yet I believe that the legislature which enacts a statute of which the following clause is the essential part will go a long way towards accomplishing this most desired result:

"And whoever shall hold, detain, restrain, or attempt to hold, detain or restrain in any house of prost.i.tution or other place, any female for the purpose of compelling such female, directly or indirectly, by her voluntary or involuntary service or labor, to pay, liquidate or cancel any debt, dues or obligation incurred therein or said to have been incurred in such house of prost.i.tution or other place, shall be deemed guilty of a felony and, upon conviction thereof, shall be imprisoned in the penitentiary at hard labor for not less than two or more than ten years."

There is only one other enactment which all legislatures should be urged to pa.s.s, and that is one which strikes directly at the white slaver, the "procurer," the owner or the "fellow." Keepers of houses of ill-fame have discovered that the hideous task of keeping the unwilling white slave in subjection is much easier if a certain ownership of her is vested in a man. In many cases this man is the one who is directly responsible for placing the girl in the house, but this is not invariably the case. When it is the case he receives not only a lump purchase price down on the delivery of his victim to the house, but he is recognized by the keeper as her owner and master, the one to whom a certain percentage of her income is paid and with whom all settlements on her account are made. What is more important in the eyes of the keeper is that this man is held absolutely responsible for the girl's subjection, and if she attempts to escape he must cajole, threaten or beat her into subjection. In one of the recent raids I chanced to come upon visual demonstration of how this peculiar phase of white slavery operates in actual practice. One of these "fellows" was disciplining a girl whom he "owned"--and doing so by the gentle process of forcing her against the wall with his hands at her throat.

Some of these "fellows" "own" two or three, or perhaps more, white slaves, and on the income of their slavery these brutes live in luxury at expensive hotels, maintain expensive automobiles and lead lives of luxury, idleness and dissipation.

While some states have statutes directly aimed at this system, it has been found extremely difficult to secure convictions against these most contemptible of all white slavers, for the reason that all of the existing statutes, so far as I am informed, make it necessary, at least by implication, for the prosecution to establish the fact that they derive their entire support from white slaves under their control--in other words, it devolves upon the state to demonstrate that the man on trial has no other visible means of support. As a consequence the defense set up is almost invariably calculated to prove that the man on trial is a solicitor for a tailoring establishment, a laundry or some other legitimate business enterprise.

In view of this fact, it seems to me an enactment drawn upon the following lines would be effective:

"Any person who shall knowingly accept or receive in whole or in part support or maintenance from the proceeds or earnings of any woman engaged in prost.i.tution shall be deemed guilty of a felony and on conviction thereof shall be confined in the penitentiary not less than one (1) nor more than three (3) years and fined not exceeding one thousand dollars, or both, in the discretion of the court."

Not long since I was asked how many persons I supposed Chicago contained who would come under a statute of this kind and who ought to receive sentence under it. My reply was this:

"Probably there are five thousand women in Chicago today following the so-called profession of prost.i.tution, and it would seem to me, from the testimony obtained in the course of the recent white slave prosecutions here that at least one-fourth that number of male parasites are supported in whole or in part in this manner and would therefore come within the meaning of such a statute."

So much for specific legislation which ought, as a protection to the young womanhood of this country, to be pa.s.sed by the legislature of every state in this country not already having statutes which adequately cover all the points involved in the clauses which I have suggested. The next practical question to be raised--and which I hope every reader of this article will ask--is this:

"How can the legislatures be induced to make these needed enactments?"

Or, to express myself a little differently, if each reader were to ask me:

"What is the quickest and most practical way by which I may get action on the legislature of my own state?"

I would suggest the following methods: Find the names of the men who represent your district in the general a.s.sembly of your state and write to each one of them a letter substantially as follows:

"Hon....................

"Dear Sir:--I am in hearty sympathy with the legislation against the white slave traffic proposed by the Woman's World and urge you to secure the pa.s.sage of laws which shall embody the clauses and enactments suggested in the enclosed article clipped from that journal.

"You surely will not question the worthiness or the need of laws of this kind and I ask the further favor of a reply from you indicating your att.i.tude with regard to this most important matter.

"Yours sincerely, ..............."

Also I would suggest that readers who are members of churches or habitual attendants upon church services, take this matter up with the pastors of their churches, each requesting his or her pastor to confer with the other pastors of his community to the end of preparing a pet.i.tion to be sent to the representatives from that district in the legislature, urging the pa.s.sage of the enactments above suggested. If these pet.i.tions are vigorously circulated they will receive the signatures of practically the entire citizenship of every community and will have a powerful, not to say compelling, influence upon the representatives and state senators who receive them. Women's Clubs, Law and Order Leagues, Christian Endeavor Societies, Epworth Leagues, Grangers and Farmers' Inst.i.tutes, Young Men's Christian a.s.sociations, Young Women's Christian a.s.sociations and Women's Temperance Unions in every city, village and hamlet of the country, scan also exert a powerful and practical influence in securing such legislation as a protection against the ravages of the white slavers by pa.s.sing suitable resolutions of endors.e.m.e.nt and sending those resolutions to the men representing their several communities in the general a.s.sembly of their state. While, as I say, these memorials on the part of respected organizations will do a useful work in shaping the course of legislation, this will not take the place or do the work of the individual personal letter, and every reader who is sincerely and earnestly interested in securing such legislation as I have outlined will miss the main stroke of influence if he or she fails to write a personal letter to the men representing his or her district in the general a.s.sembly of the state.

And whenever such a letter is written the various clauses given in this article should be incorporated in the letter; this will put your request in definite and explicit terms, a result greatly to be desired.

I cannot close this article without recurring to the statement made at the outset to the effect that many persons still remain unconvinced that the white slave traffic is a thing of widespread and actual existence; that it is the established calling of hundreds of men to lure and kidnap innocent girls into a life of shame and to sell them into houses of prost.i.tution, where they are kept against their will in the most revolting of all human slaveries.

In my desk at this moment is a letter from which the following is taken:

"There are in that house, No. ----, two girls by the names of Annie and Edith. One has been there for two years and is not allowed to go out of the house. . . . is not even allowed to write to her own people, and whose mail is opened and read before she is allowed to look at it. The other girl has been there seven months and has never been out of the house."