DUKE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 library 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2017 with funding from 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 https://archive.org/details/socialevil01 newy 
 


 THE SOCIAL EVIL 
 
 V^ITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO CONDITIONS 
 EXISTING IN THE CITY OF NEW YORK 
 
 A REPORT PREPARED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF 
 THE COMMITTEE OF FIFTEEN 
 
 / 3 ^ 
 
 G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 
 
 NEW YORK AND LONDON 
 Zbe finiciterbociter press 
 
 1902 
 
COPVRIGHT* 1902 
 BY 
 
 G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 
 
 Set up, electrotyped, and printed February, 1902. 
 Reprinted March, 1902 ; April, 1902. 
 
 Ube Uinicftecbocher ipcess, l^evp l^orb 
 
// - ^ 
 
 /' 
 
 J 
 
 MEMBERS OF THE COMMITTEE 
 
 OF FIFTEEN 
 
 William H. Baldwin, Jr., Chairman, 
 Felix Adler, 
 
 Joel B. Erhardt, 
 
 Austen G. Fox, 
 
 John S. Kennedy, 
 
 William J. O’Brien, 
 
 Alexander E. Orr, 
 
 George Foster Peabody, 
 
 George Haven Putnam, 
 
 J. Harsen Rhoades, 
 
 Jacob H. Schiff, 
 
 Andrew J. Smith, 
 
 Charles Sprague Smith, 
 
 Charles Stewart Smith. 
 
 Edwin R. A. Seligman, Secretary. 
 
 Ill 
 
PREFACE 
 
 In the fall of 1900, the city of New York 
 was startled by discoveries in regard to the 
 spread of the Social Evil in certain districts, 
 and as to the extent of flagrant offences against 
 public morality and common decency. A meet- 
 ing of citizens was held at the Chamber of 
 Commerce in November, as a result of which 
 the Committee of Fifteen was called into ex- 
 istence. The objects which the Committee of 
 Fifteen undertook to accomplish were there- 
 upon stated as follows : 
 
 (1) To institute a searching inquiry, unin- 
 fluenced by partisan considerations, into the 
 causes of the present alarming increase of 
 gambling and the Social Evil in this city, and 
 to collect such evidence as shall establish the 
 connection between existing conditions and 
 those who, in the last analysis, are responsible 
 for these conditions. 
 
 (2) To publish the results of such investiga- 
 tions in order to put our fellow-citizens in pos- 
 
VI 
 
 Preface 
 
 session of facts, and to enable them to adopt 
 such corrective measures as may be needed. 
 
 (3) To promote such legislation as shall 
 render it less difficult to reach offenders, and 
 as shall put an end to the shifting and division 
 of responsibility in the local administration of 
 the laws relating to vice and crime, to the end 
 that public officers and their subordinates may 
 be held to a strict accountability for their acts. 
 
 (4) To suggest and promote the provision 
 of more wholesome conditions and surround- 
 ings, in order to lessen the allurements and 
 incentives to vice and crime. 
 
 During the winter and spring of 1901 the 
 Committee devoted its attention chiefly to the 
 first object. Its corps of investigators collected 
 a mass of information and evidence, a part of 
 which was utilized in bringing some of the 
 offenders to justice, and in exposing the no- 
 torious “ cadet” system. The Committee also 
 co-operated with the framers of the new Tene- 
 ment House Bill in securing its enactment into 
 law. As a result of this law and of the facts 
 collected by the Committee, it became possible 
 to take measures for the eradication of prosti- 
 tution from the tenement houses. 
 
Preface vii 
 
 The overthrow of the control of the munici- 
 pal administration by Tammany Hall and the 
 success of the Reform movement in the muni- 
 cipal campaign of 1901 (a campaign in which 
 the information supplied by the Committee of 
 Fifteen constituted a very important factor) 
 rendered it possible for the Committee to 
 abandon any further work of a police nature 
 or having to do with the supervision of public 
 morals. 
 
 The third object of the Committee, however, 
 was to promote satisfactory legislation on the 
 subject of the Social Evil. In order to make 
 intelligent preparation for its recommenda- 
 tions, a sub-committee was appointed to make 
 a study of the history of regulation and its ap- 
 plication to present conditions in New York. 
 The sub-committee was fortunate in securing 
 for this work the services of Mr. Alvin S. 
 Johnson, at the time University Fellow in 
 Economics at Columbia University, a'nd now 
 Instructor in Economics at Bryn-Mawr Col- 
 lege. The investigation contained in Part I. 
 is almost entirely the work of Mr. Johnson, to 
 whom the thanks of the Committee are due. 
 It is believed not only that the report consti- 
 tutes a valuable scientific contribution to the 
 
Preface 
 
 viii 
 
 subject, but that in no other publication can 
 there be found so comprehensive or so clear a 
 statement of the problems involved. Certain 
 features of the Raines Law are so intimately 
 connected with the existence of prostitution in 
 New York that it has been deemed wise to 
 include in the appendix an account of that law. 
 
 The conclusions and recommendations of 
 the Committee itself are found in Part II. 
 The appendix to this part contains a summary 
 of the operations of the Committee with special 
 relation to the “cadet” system and to the ex- 
 istence of the Social Evil in tenement houses. 
 
 New York, January 2, 1902. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PART I 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 PAGB 
 
 The Problem of Prostitution . . . . i 
 
 Universality of the social evil, i — Variations in the volume 
 of vice, 3 — Characteristics of prostitution in ancient, 
 mediaeval, and modern times, 5 — Causes of prostitu- 
 tion, 7 — City life as stimulating masculine vice, 8 — 
 Characteristics of the feminine factor in vice, 10 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 Regulation — Ancient, Medieval, and Mod- 
 ern ......... 13 
 
 Aims of ancient regulation, 13 — Masculine impurity over- 
 looked, 14 — Free women of loose morals assimilated 
 to slave class, 15 — Mediaeval policy originally repres- 
 sive, 17 — Ends of mediaeval regulation, 18 — Role of 
 prostitute in social life of Middle Ages, 19 — Break- 
 down of mediaeval regulation, 22 — Modern regulation 
 entirely distinct from mediaeval, 22 — Prominence of 
 sanitary feature, 24 
 
 CHAPTER HI 
 
 Regulation of Prostitution in Paris . . 25 
 
 Germ of discretionary power of police, 26 — First treatment 
 of imprisoned prostitutes, 26 — Treatment preliminary 
 to imprisonment, 27 — Origin of idea of registration, 
 
 28 — Preventive inspection, 29 — Collection of fees from 
 
 IX 
 
X Contents 
 
 PAGE 
 
 prostitutes ; abuses, 30 — Plan of confining vice to li- 
 censed houses, 30 — Abolition of fees, 31 — Registration 
 of minors, 31 — Present system, 32 — Morals service, 
 
 33 — Medical service, 33 — Legal basis, 34 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 Regulation in Berlin and in Other Cities of 
 
 Europe 37 
 
 Breakdown of mediaeval regulation in Berlin, 37 — Regula- 
 tions of 1700, 38 — Growth of vice in the eighteenth 
 century, 39 — Regulations of 1792, 40 — Principle of 
 responsibility, 40— Penalty upon transmission of dis- 
 ease, 41 — Periodic examinations, 41 — Taxation, 42 — 
 Hostility to regulation, 43 — Attempt to localize vice, 
 
 45 — Closing of licensed houses, 48 — Existing regula- 
 tions, 50— Essential similarity of systems of Paris and 
 Berlin, 51 — Segregation in Bremen, 54 — Morals service 
 in Vienna, 55 — Extent of sanitary regulation, 56 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 The Sanitary Aspect of Modern Regulation . 58 
 
 Difficulty of ascertaining extent of venereal disease, 58 — 
 Reporting of disease in Norway, 59 — Disease in Euro- 
 pean armies, 62 — Serious nature of burden upon society, 
 
 63 — Disease common to all ranks, 65 — To regard dis- 
 ease as a just penalty for vice a narrow view, 65 — Youth 
 of many who are contaminated, 66 — Innocent victims, 
 
 67 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 The Moral Aspect of Regulation ... 69 
 
 Vice a greater evil than disease, 69 — Need of social action 
 against vice, 70 — Possibility of amelioration, 71 — Pro- 
 tection of children, 72 — Poverty and vice, 73 — Restora- 
 tion of fallen women to honorable life, 74 
 
Contents 
 
 XI 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 Fundamental Opposition between Moral and 
 
 Sanitary Control 76 
 
 Friction between morals and sanitary service, 76 — Essential 
 features of sanitary control, 77 — Complexity of modern 
 vice, 80 — Temporary prostitution, 80 — Registration a 
 deterrent to reform, 81 — Registration of minors inad- 
 missible, 83 — State control as encouragement to vice, 
 
 85 — Regulation as a handicap in the effecting of moral 
 reform, 86 — Regulation a violation of the best public 
 sentiment, 90— Encroachment upon individual liberty, 
 
 91 
 
 CHAPTER VHI 
 
 Practical Difficulties in the Regulation of 
 
 Prostitution 93 
 
 A great part of prostitution cannot be subjected to control, 
 
 93 — Minors, 94 — Clandestine prostitutes, 94 — Diffi- 
 culty in compelling submission, 95 — Percentage of 
 prostitution actually controlled in European cities, 98 — 
 
 The part subjected not really the most dangerous, 
 
 99— Subjected prostitutes not rendered innocuous, 104 
 —Imperfection of present method of inspection, 105 — 
 Expensiveness of efficient system, 106 — Impossibility 
 of self-sustaining morals service, 107 — Evasion on part 
 of diseased, 109 — Insufficiency of treatment, in — 
 Mediate contagion, 113 — Amelioration only temporary 
 at best, 1 14 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 The Actual Effectiveness of Sanitary Con- 
 trol 1 16 
 
 Worthlessness of comparisons of morbidity between different 
 cities, 117 — Imperfections of venereal statistics, 118 — 
 Spontaneous fluctuations in disease, 1 19 — Statistics for 
 England for period of Contagious Diseases Acts, 120— 
 
XU 
 
 Contents 
 
 Criticism, i2i — Danger of applying results of small 
 cities to facts of large ones, 123 — Norwegian statistics, 
 124 — Italian regulations, 127 — Dorpat, 128 — St. Louis, 
 129 — Modern tendency to discard statistics, 130 — 
 Common sense, 131 — Opinions of modern authorities, 
 
 133 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 Probable Effectiveness of Regulation in 
 
 New York ....... 135 
 
 Legal considerations, 135 — Prostitution a status, 136; a 
 special trade, 137 — Difficulty of establishing fact of 
 prostitution, 138 — Control of prostitution compared 
 with measures for checking contagious diseases, 138 — 
 Penalizing of debauch as basis of control, 139 — Diffi- 
 culty of coping with clandestine prostitution in New 
 York, 140 — Impossibility of keeping suspected part of 
 population under surveillance, 141 — Migration as an 
 additional difficulty in control, 142 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 Moral Regulation of Vice .... 145 
 
 Repression and reglementation not essentially hostile, 145 — 
 Possibility of a system embodying common elements, 
 
 146— Preservation of public decency, 147 — Dissociation 
 of vice and legitimate pleasures, 14S — Control in 
 brothels, 149 — Children to be freed from contact with 
 vice, 150 — Housing conditions, 151 — Education, 152 — 
 Prostitution of minors, 153 — Necessity of free treat- 
 ment for venereal disease, 154 — Infection of innocent 
 persons, 156 — Administration, 157 
 
 APPENDIX 
 
 The Raines Law Hotel and the Social Evil . 159 
 
Contents 
 
 PART II 
 
 Recommendations of the Committee 
 
 APPENDIX 
 
 Present Conditions in New York . 
 
 xiii 
 
 PAGB 
 
 171 
 
 181 
 
PART I. 
 
THE SOCIAL EVIL 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE PROBLEM OF PROSTITUTION 
 
 Prost itut ions ^ a phenomenon coextensive 
 with civilized society. Barbarous and semi- 
 barbardus pimples have at times^been free 
 from it. The ancienf'Gerrfians, we are tojd,' 
 tolerated no prostitution inNfGir midst ; and 
 there are sa^tb^be Siberian and ^ Afr ican tribes 
 to-day of which the same thing is true. But 
 ho s ooner has^ phople attained_-a_nioderate 
 degree oTcivilization than this social cursNias' 
 ^A ialTen upo nj^ ! noi" bas any race reached a point 
 
 of moral elevatioh^Bel^thiNQniiLnfAdi¥^s 
 ' — disap peared. 
 
 r The most venerable traditions, the most 
 ancient records all bear testimony to the an- 
 tiquity of prostitution. Even a careless reader 
 of Scripture knows how constantly it beset the 
 ancient Hebrews, and how vain were the efforts 
 
2 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 of sages and lawgivers to stamp it out. Nur- 
 tured by a vicious religion, it flourished 
 throughout Asia Minor ; and when civilization 
 moved westward to Greece and Rome, pros- 
 titution followed as its shadow. The rise of 
 the mediaeval cities in Western Europe was 
 marked by the introduction of the brothel. 
 The great development of trade and commerce 
 that ushered in modern times was also re- 
 sponsible for the universalizing of “ the social 
 evil.” 
 
 / Glancing at present conditions, we find that 
 I no important nation is free from the taint. 
 / The great cities of the world vie with each 
 other in the vast numbers of those who gain 
 their living by immorality. Nor is there 
 reason to think that this condition is transitory. 
 He would be an optimist indeed who could be- 
 lieve that a time will come when the problem 
 of prostitution shall cease to be important. 
 Li ke the pauper, the prostitute is a creatu re 
 of^.xbdligatiQ n, and, like the pauper, will con- 
 I t mue to thrus t he r undesirable presence upon 
 \society. 
 
 ( '"~TKeTact that prostitution is practically uni- 
 versal has impressed itself strongly upon the 
 numerous writers who have dealt with the sub- 
 
The Problem of Prostitution 
 
 3 
 
 ject. The inference has frequently been drawn 
 that all efforts to suppress or restrict vice must 
 be vain, and that the only rational course to 
 pursue is to recognize its existence and to 
 minimize its attendant dangers. There have 
 been authorities who held the view that vice is 
 an essential element in society, hence ineradi- 
 cable. Others have gone so far as to affirm 
 that what is best and purest in civilization could 
 not have existed but for the sacrifice of a por- 
 tion of womankind to immorality.^ Tim sane r 
 authorities, however, content thems elves w ith 
 stating that vice is the inevitaH ^ resul t ^f 
 causes "^h ich sU^cie ty hag~i T^e~r y et bee n abl e 
 to control. 
 
 Y' It is frequently said that vice is a constant 
 '^and invariable element in social life. This is, 
 however, obviously untrue. So far as one can 
 judge from the fragmentary history of morality, 
 periods of gross licentiousness have alternated 
 with periods of comparative decency. The 
 degrading influence that intercourse with a 
 lascivious nation has exercised upon a people 
 of comparatively pure morals is well known to 
 every student of history. The Romans were 
 
 ’ Lecky, History of European Morals, ii., 299. 
 
 Hiigel, Zur Geschichie, Statistik und Regelung der Prostitution, 76. 
 
4 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 ' disciples of the Greeks in immorality as well as 
 I in arts and sciences. The renewal of inter- 
 ; course with the East that followed the Cru- 
 sades was attended by a serious deterioration 
 of European morals. On the other hand, the 
 spread of Christianity, the Reformation, and 
 the rise of chivalry, it is generally admitted, 
 brought about a decided improvement in the 
 ^moral tone of Europe. 
 
 Social and economic changes have frequently 
 been marked by an increase or a diminution 
 in vice. A prolonged war, more especially if 
 it be a civil war, has generally resulted in an 
 exaggeration of this evil. The Thirty Years’ 
 War and the French Revolution are notorious 
 1 in this respect. Even minor phenomena, such 
 \ as commercial disturbances, are not without a 
 \jiemonstrable effect upon the volume of vice. 
 
 That vice is a varying phenomenon, bearing 
 /no constant relation to population, is evident to 
 anyone who has studied the conditions of mod- 
 ern cities. It has been affirmed that the great- 
 er the city, the larger will be the proportion of 
 the vicious. While this is probably true, yet 
 certain cities have attained a pre-eminence in 
 evil reputation that is not to be accounted for 
 merely by their size and wealth. 
 
The Problem of Prostitution 
 
 5 
 
 This fact, that vice varies from age to age 
 and from place to place, is a sufficient indi- 
 cation that the causes of which it is the result 
 do not operate witii uniform force. It sug- 
 gests the idea that while it may be impossible 
 to control all of the causes of prostitution, and 
 so to eradicate it, certain of them may be 
 brought under control, with the result of limit- 
 ing the evil. 
 
 Not less striking than the variations in the 
 volume of vice are the variations in its general 
 character. In Rome the masculine factor in 
 vice consisted in the soldiers and freedmen, 
 the gladiators and ruffians, the throngs of the 
 idle and turbulent that congregated in the 
 great capital of the world. The feminine 
 factor was made up chiefly of the vast num- 
 bers of slave women, captured in the unceas- 
 ing wars of conquest. Roman vice reached 
 its climax when these elements grew to such 
 proportions as to overshadow orderly society. 
 In the Middle Ages the masculine factor con- 
 sisted in the soldiers of fortune, travellers and 
 outlaws, apprentices and pseudo-clergy, that 
 made up the floating population. The femi- 
 nine factor was largely composed of women 
 abducted by robber bands, captured in petty 
 
6 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 wars and abused by the soldiery, and of the 
 neglected offspring of these unfortunates. As 
 the floating population increased with the 
 breaking up of the old order, as wars became 
 more prolonged and their demoralizing effect 
 more general, mediaeval prostitution attained 
 extraordinary proportions. All society seemed 
 to be demoralized. Modern prostitution bears 
 the peculiar stamp of modern social and indus- 
 trial conditions. The hosts of unmarried 
 workers of the great trading or industrial city 
 represent the masculine factor ; the feminine 
 factor consists of women and girls from the 
 midst of the social organism who have been 
 impelled by circumstances to make a quasi- 
 voluntary choice of prostitution as a means of 
 livelihood. Speaking generally, we may say 
 that the ancient prostitute was a slave, the 
 mediaeval prostitute an alien, the modern pros/ 
 titute is a citizen. 
 
 The fact is not to be overlooked that there 
 is an element in prostitution which remains 
 fairly constant. In every society there have 
 been women whom circumstances have des- 
 tined for honorable life, but who from innate 
 perversity chose the life of shame. Modern 
 criminal anthropologists have shown that in 
 
The Problem of Prostitution 
 
 7 
 
 physical, mental and moral characteristics 
 these women form a type which varies little 
 with time and place. Some scientists have 
 gone so far as to declare that these are the 
 only real prostitutes.^ 
 
 The truth seems to be, however, that the 
 importance of this element is greatly overesti- 
 mated. The victim of force or fraud, or of 
 adverse social and economic conditions, soon 
 reaches, a point where she is indistinguishable 
 from the congenital pervert. 
 f It is a trite saying that the real cause, the 
 I causa causans, of prostitution is to be sought 
 [in the male factor. A community, it is said, 
 I will have as much vice as it is willing to pay 
 i for. “ Demand will create a supply.” In this 
 I bald and cynical form the statement is ob- 
 ‘ viously untrue. There is not in any com- 
 munity an indefinite number of women who 
 are ready to sell their honor for a sufficient 
 ^ price. The number who do so varies chiefly 
 ' for reasons that are independent of the “ de- 
 mand.” Nevertheless, the idea is not without 
 I a fraction of truth. Under existing condi- 
 tions, many women are attracted, rather than 
 forced, into prostitution. The greater the 
 
 * Lombroso, B. Tarnowsky, Pauline Tarnowsky, Strohmberg. 
 
8 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 j earnings of the prostitute, the richer her attire, 
 
 / and the more luxurious her mode of life, the 
 
 I , , 
 
 stronger is the attraction for those who are 
 I upon the border-land of vice and virtue. Ac- 
 i cordingly, any account of the causes of prosti- 
 I tution may properly begin with a consideration 
 of the general reasons that are responsible for 
 I an extensive “ demand.” 
 
 This problem is intimately connected with 
 that of the movement of population toward 
 the city. A great part of the population of a 
 modern city consists of young men who have 
 drifted thither from the country and small 
 towns, attracted by the greater opportunities 
 of rising in social life and by the greater de- 
 gree of personal comfort that the city offers. 
 As a rule, the income that a yo ung man earns^ 
 whiTe sufHcTeht fb~secuFe~a Tair decree of com- 
 
 _ _ o ^ 
 
 fort for himself, does not suffice for founding a 
 family. As his income increases, his stan d- 
 ard of personal comfor t rises : accordingly, I m 
 postpon es marriage^ until a date m tlm in- 
 , definite futur e, or ab^dons e^ect ation of j t . 
 altogether . — His-ixiter^s centre almost wholly 
 In himself. He is responsible to no one but * 
 himselfi The~pl^Ssures that he may obtain 
 Trom day tb~day~become~tTie'~chief end of his 
 
The Problem of Prostitution 
 
 Tfe. A popular philosophy of hedonism fur- 
 nishes him with a theoretical justification for 
 the inclinations that are developed by the cir- 
 cumstances in which he is placed. It is not 
 unnatural, then, that the strongest native im- 
 pulse of man should find expression in the only 
 way open to it — indulgence in vice. 
 
 At the same time that personal scruples 
 with regard to continency dissolve in the 
 crucible of city life, the main external check 
 upon a man’s conduct, the opinion of his 
 neighbors, which has such a powerful influ- 
 ence in the country or small town, tends to 
 disappear. In a great city one has no neigh- 
 bors. No man knows the doings of even his 
 close friends ; few men care what the secret 
 life of their friends may be. Thus, with his 
 moral sensibilities blunted, the young man is 
 left free to follow his own inclinations. The 
 greater the city, as a rule, the more pro- 
 nounced in this respect is its demoralizing 
 influence ; and our cities are growing steadily 
 greater and are in an ever greater degree set- 
 ting the moral tone for the country as a whole. 
 The problem of masculine vice, it will be seen, 
 is an integral part of that infinitely complex 
 problem, the “ Social Question.” 
 
lO 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 It would be impossible in a brief sketch to 
 analyze the complicated phenomena of femi- 
 nine vice. It is possible, however, to select a 
 few of the most important and most character- 
 istically modern elements. In the first place, 
 there is a large class of women who may be 
 said to have been trained for prostitution from 
 earliest childhood. Foundlings and orphans 
 and the offspring of the miserably poor, they 
 grow up in wretched tenements, contaminated 
 by constant familiarity with vice in its lowest 
 forms. Without training, mental or moral, they 
 remain ignorant and disagreeable, slovenly and 
 uncouth, good for nothing in the social and 
 economic organism. When half matured they 
 fall the willing victims of their male associates, 
 and inevitably drift into prostitution. This 
 element is to be found in almost every large 
 city ; but it is in London where it is to be 
 found in the greatest extent and the greatest 
 hideousness. 
 
 Another form is closely connected with the 
 appearance of women in industry. In many 
 cities there are great classes of women without 
 any resources excepting their earnings as nee- 
 dlewomen, day-workers, domestics, or factory 
 hands. These earnings are often so small as 
 
The Problem of Prostitution 1 1 
 
 barely to suffice for the urgent needs of the 
 day. A season of non-employment presents 
 them with the alternatives of starvation or 
 prostitution. These form the “ occasional 
 prostitutes,” who, according to Blaschko, far 
 outnumber all others in the city of Berlin. 
 When employment is again to be had they 
 withdraw from the life of shame, if its ir- 
 regularities have not incapacitated them for 
 honorable labor. 
 
 A third class, one which is more or less 
 typical of American prostitution, is made up 
 of those who cannot be said to be driven into 
 prostitution either by absolute want or by ex- 
 ceptionally pernicious surroundings. They 
 may be employed at living wages, but the 
 prospect of continuing from year to year with 
 no change from tedious and irksome labor 
 creates discontent and eventually rebellion. 
 They, too, are impregnated with the view that 
 individual happiness is the end of life, and 
 their lives bring them no happiness, and 
 promise them none. The circumstances of 
 city life make it possible for them to experiment 
 with immorality without losing such social stand- 
 ing as they may have, and thus many of them 
 drift gradually into professional prostitution. 
 
12 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 Any social problem, it must be remembered, 
 appears impossible of solution when whole 
 classes are viewed as units. The influences 
 that are chiefly responsible for the great mass 
 of vice are not within the control of govern- 
 ment. Yet it is evident that there are infinite 
 gradations from those who would remain pure 
 under any circumstances to those who are al- 
 most destined by nature or surroundings to 
 succumb to vice, and that those who are upon 
 the margin of a life of shame may be rescued 
 or degraded by social action. By private and 
 public means something can be done to improve 
 the surroundings of poor children, to relieve 
 the distress of industrial workers in times of 
 non-employment, to improve the outlook of 
 those women whose lives are to be spent in the 
 abnormal environment of factory and shop. 
 Experience has shown the futility of measures 
 that aim to abolish the evil. There is, how- 
 ever, every a priori reason to believe that its 
 extent may be limited by a judicious policy of 
 prevention. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 REGULATION ANCIENT, MEDIyEVAL, AND 
 
 MODERN 
 
 Of the ancient nations with the life of which 
 we are best acquainted, the Hebrews alone 
 understood that prostitution is itself a serious 
 evil. The Greeks and the Romans saw clearly 
 that certain evils resulted from it, and it was 
 their constant endeavor to divest it of those at- 
 tendant evils. The trend of Jewish legislation 
 may accordingly be described as repressive ; 
 that of Greece and Rome as regulative. 
 
 In Greece and Rome the evils that were the 
 subject of legislation were religious, social and 
 political— never hygienic. Religion required 
 that the family should be preserved in its in- 
 tegrity from generation to generation ; hence 
 anything that would make legitimacy of off- 
 spring doubtful was execrated. Politics re- 
 quired the greatest possible number of citizens 
 of pure blood ; hence anything that would in- 
 capacitate the daughters of citizens for mar- 
 
 13 
 
H 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 riage and motherhood was considered a public 
 calamity. As a result, we find a body of drastic 
 legislation which made the woman whose honor 
 was tainted a total outcast from society. It was 
 the aim of the legislator to prevent, so far as 
 possible, the fall of free women, and to make 
 impossible the return to decent society of such 
 as had fallen. 
 
 The social consequences of masculine vice 
 practically escaped the notice of the Greek and 
 Roman. Although there is evidence enough 
 that venereal disease existed, its effect upon 
 the welfare of the community was not under- 
 stood. The existence of a numerous class of 
 slaves obviated the necessity of sacrificing free 
 women to immorality. Accordingly, it is not 
 surprising that the utmost latitude of conduct 
 was granted to the freeman, while regularity of 
 life on the part of free women was enforced 
 with the utmost severity. The preservation of 
 city, clan and family depended upon the 
 chastity of the women ; it did not depend in 
 anything like the same degree upon the chas- 
 tity of the men. 
 
 It was impossible, to be sure, to confine vice 
 absolutely to slave women. But if free women 
 fell, they were assimilated to the class of slaves. 
 
15 
 
 Regulation 
 
 In Rome they had no right to enjoy their 
 property, they had no control over their chil- 
 dren, they could not give oath or make ac- 
 cusation. Their status differed from that of 
 slaves in that they had no particular master. 
 They were, in a sense, public property, and 
 were required to live in quarters set apart for 
 them, and were subjected to regulations as to 
 dress and conduct which might distinguish 
 them as such wherever they might be. In 
 Rome, as early as i8o b.c., they were regis- 
 tered in the books of the aediles, in order that 
 their peculiar status might be the more per- 
 fectly defined.^ 
 
 After Rome had grown into a world empire, 
 the line between slave and serf, freedman and 
 free-born, tended to become obscure. At the 
 same time, a thorough degradation of morals 
 permeated all society, so that it was no longer 
 possible to separate the immoral from the 
 honorable. Prostitutes still formed a special 
 class, but such regulation as continued to exist 
 
 ' The origin of the special quarter and the special garb is proba- 
 bly to be found in the fact that the public women were originally 
 “priestesses" of Venus, and lived in the precincts of the shrines 
 and wore a garb indicating their religious office. The transition to 
 the status of public slaves with the fading out of the religious idea 
 can be easily understood. 
 
i6 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 had for its chief purpose the collection of 
 revenue from the earnings of the public pros- 
 titute. This end also was abandoned when a 
 higher type of imperial authority realized the 
 dishonor of public sharing in infamous gains. 
 Under the Christian Emperors repressive laws 
 were enacted, thus concluding definitely classi- 
 cal regulation of vice.^ 
 
 Modern writers have sometimes claimed 
 that prostitution was “ tolerated ” in Rome 
 and Greece as a means of combating the un- 
 natural vice which was so common in ancient 
 civilization. It is a sufficient refutation of this 
 position that not until a comparatively late 
 date was unnatural vice considered an evil, 
 while prostitution was permitted from the ear- 
 liest times. Moreover, so numerous were the 
 slave women devoted to infamy that it is diffi- 
 cult to conceive how anyone can believe that 
 it was dearth of “ natural ” vice that was respon- 
 sible for the hideous development of unnatural 
 vice that disfigured the history of decadent 
 Greece and Rome. 
 
 Mediceval Regulation of Vice . — At the be- 
 ginning of the Middle Ages the states of 
 
 ' Parent-Duchatelet, De la Prostitution dans la ville de Paris, 
 3d ed., vol. ii., 268. 
 
Regulation 
 
 17 
 
 Western Europe pursued a strictly repres- 
 sive policy with regard to prostitution. The 
 capitularies of Charlemagne imposed upon the 
 prostitute and those who sheltered her impris- 
 onment, whipping and exposure. For this 
 severity, the legislation of the late Roman and 
 Byzantine Emperors was no doubt partially 
 responsible. A more potent influence was, 
 however, exercised by the early Teutonic cus- 
 toms and laws. Tacitus states that in some 
 German tribes women of unchaste life were 
 punished by death. The Salic law prescribed 
 banishment for them, and the laws of the Visi- 
 goths (600 A.D.) inflicted the penalty of beating 
 with rods. 
 
 But as population increased and became 
 more settled the treatment of the vicious 
 underwent a gradual change. By the tenth 
 century, the persecution of the prostitute had 
 practically ceased. Prostitution came to be 
 tolerated, but under regulations that were 
 aimed to divest it of the consequences that to 
 the mediaeval mind seemed evil. In 1180 
 Henry II. gave a royal patent for the legaliza- 
 tion of public houses of prostitution in London. 
 They were established in Hamburg in the year 
 1272 ; Regensburg, 1306; Zurich, 1314; Basel, 
 
i8 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 1356; Avignon, 1347; Vienna, 1384. The 
 ordinance of St. Louis, 1254, and the laws of 
 Naples of the eleventh and twelfth centuries 
 reflect the severity of early Teutonic legisla- 
 tion. These laws were, however, merely the 
 outcome of the religious zeal of the rulers ; 
 they did not represent the public sentiment of 
 the time. They do not appear ever to have 
 been systematically enforced. 
 
 Mediaeval regulation is best understood by 
 reference to the ends it was designed to meet. 
 Preservation of the existing order of things 
 was regarded as of cardinal importance. The 
 integrity of the family was looked upon as 
 vital ; accordingly, the severest penalties were 
 inflicted upon unchaste wives and daughters 
 of burghers. It was believed that if provision 
 were made for the satisfaction of the vicious 
 impulses of the floating population, the family 
 would be secured from invasion. Therefore 
 the brothel was not only tolerated ; it was con- 
 sidered a necessary and a useful adjunct to 
 city life. This will account for the fact that 
 the house of ill fame was often built at public ex- 
 pense and managed on public account, and for 
 the voting of funds for securing from abroad 
 inmates for the public house. It also explains 
 
Regulation 
 
 19 
 
 the condition sometimes imposed upon the 
 citizen who leased such an establishment, that 
 he should provide a sufficient number of suit- 
 able inmates. 
 
 It was also essential that public women 
 should form a class absolutely distinct. They 
 were normally secured from foreign countries, 
 or, at any rate, from beyond the city’s domain. 
 They remained aliens ; and if any woman from 
 within the ranks of decent society fell from 
 virtue, she became an alien in status and was 
 forever debarred from returning to her kin. 
 They were required to live in a special quarter 
 and wear a distinguishing mark upon their 
 clothing, usually a yellow or red ribbon upon 
 the sleeve, so that no mistake might be made 
 as to their character. 
 
 There was no trace of the modern feeling 
 that vice should be quite hidden from respecta- 
 bility, ignored by decent society. The pros- 
 titute played no mean role in the social life of 
 the Middle Ages. As such, she took part in 
 public processions, and even in sacred festivals.^ 
 The brothel was bound to entertain notables 
 
 * The student of the origin of social customs will at once suspect a 
 relation between the functions of public women at festivals and the 
 orgies in celebration of certain pagan deities. As a fact, the connec- 
 tion would not be difficult to trace. 
 
20 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 who visited the city. In short, the Middle 
 Ages believed vice to be nothing evil, so long 
 as it showed its true colors. 
 
 The second aim of the mediaeval legislator 
 was to prevent the brothel from becoming a 
 centre of disorder. At all times the prostitute 
 and the outlaw have been natural allies. 
 Wherever houses of ill fame were grouped in 
 special quarters, thieves and cut-throats con- 
 gregated, menacing the persons and property 
 of the citizens.^ 
 
 It was the mediaeval policy to fix responsi- 
 bility upon groups, rather than upon individ- 
 uals. This idea appears in the regulation of 
 prostitution. Sometimes the public women 
 were organized in guilds, which chose a head 
 who was responsible for everything that might 
 occur in the brothel. This was the case in 
 Nuremberg ; and, after the fashion of other 
 guilds, the licensed prostitutes took it upon 
 themselves to prosecute persons who infringed 
 upon their monopoly. Sometimes they were 
 
 ’ In 1367 two quarters were set apart by the Parisian authorities 
 for prostitution, the Glatigny and the Hueleu. Great numbers of 
 thieves, robbers and vagabonds flocked together in these quarters, 
 making of them veritable strongholds, whence vice and crime could 
 raid the city with impunity. The police were defled and even royal 
 edicts for demolishing the places were for decades set at nought. — 
 Carlier, Les Deux Prostitutions, 11-13. 
 
Regulation 
 
 21 
 
 placed under the charge of a special official 
 who decided all cases of injury committed by 
 them or against them ; in still other places a 
 special court was created for their control. 
 Where a brothel was let to a responsible citi- 
 zen, he was compelled to undertake all respon- 
 sibility for the conduct of its inmates. 
 
 One further object held in view by the 
 mediaeval legislator was the organization of 
 prostitution for fiscal purposes. As possessors 
 of a lucrative occupation, they were compelled 
 to contribute to the public treasury. There 
 seems to have been no hesitancy about accept- 
 ing for public purposes a part of the earnings 
 of shame. Even the Church did not stick at 
 such revenues.^ 
 
 Mediaeval regulations, then, possessed gen-’' 
 erally these three aims : prevention of vicious 
 conduct on the part of citizen women, codec- / 
 tion of revenues from prostitution, and pres- 
 ervation of public order. 
 
 As in the case of classical regulation, aims 
 that were possible of realization while the cities 
 were of moderate size and while social relations 
 
 ‘ Clement VIII. compelled public women to give a part of their 
 earnings to the Convent of St. Mary of Penitence. — Tammeo, La 
 Prostituzione, 30. 
 
22 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 were fixed, were not capable of realization 
 when the old order broke up under the social 
 and economic changes at the end of the Middle 
 Ages. Society as a whole became corrupt ; 
 the alien character of prostitution disappeared. 
 Sumptuary laws were enacted, because it was 
 thought that it was the jewelry and fine cloth- 
 ing of the prostitute that attracted decent girls 
 and women into the life of shame. At about 
 the same time an epidemic of syphilis spread 
 over Europe, assuming, as a result of the gen- 
 eral immorality, the proportions of a world 
 plague. Under the influence of this evil the 
 licensed houses of prostitution were pretty gen- 
 erally closed during a considerable part of the 
 15th and 1 6th centuries. Re-opened again, 
 they lived by the strength of traditional usage 
 until replaced by modern regulation of pros- 
 titution, or, as it is generally known, regie- 
 mentation. 
 
 Modern Regiilation . — Modern regulation is 
 almost wholly distinct from that of mediaeval 
 and classical times, both in its ends and in the 
 means it employs to secure them. The med- 
 iaeval city strove to insure the welfare of its 
 own citizens ; it cared nothing for the moral 
 welfare of the aliens who were the victims of 
 
Regulation 
 
 23 
 
 its policy. The ejttension of the unit of society 
 from the single city tO-the nation, from the 
 nation to the civilized world, has awakened the 
 public conscience to the fact that even the pros- 
 titute is a member of society. Under modern 
 conditions, it is inconceivable that a political 
 body should aid in the securing of victims for 
 vice, even if it were still believed that the ex- 
 istence of a vicious class is a safeguard for the 
 virtuous ; for the victims must necessarily be 
 recruited from orderly society, — in the last in- 
 stance, from the ranks of the virtuous.' 
 
 Accordingly, the moral point of view has 
 changed completely. Every modern system 
 of regulation avows the purpose of preventing, 
 as far as possible, the degradation of those 
 who are not yet depraved, and the rescue and 
 restoration to honorable life of fallen women 
 who are still susceptible to moral influences. 
 
 But the chief distinguishing feature of mod- 
 ern regulation is its endeavor to stamp out the 
 diseases that everywhere attend vice. N othing 
 
 ' Certain authors have caught at the idea of a supposed natural 
 class of degenerate women, reversions to a non-moral type, as fitting 
 victims for social vice. It is no hardship, they claim, that such 
 creatures should be permitted to follow their own natures. This is 
 ' evidently an attempt to restore the alien status of the prostitute. It 
 is not worth while to point out the weakness of the position. — See 
 Strdhmberg, dt., passim. 
 
24 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 analogous to this aim is to be found in 
 ancient and mediaeval regulation.^ 
 
 So prominent has the sanitary aspect of the 
 problem of vice become that the term “ regula- 
 tion ” is used generally to denote sanitary regu- 
 lation alone. 
 
 One end that modern regulation has in 
 common with mediaeval regulation is the dis- 
 sociation of vice from crime. In the Middle 
 Ages, this end was partially attained by fixing 
 responsibility not upon the individual prosti- 
 tute, but upon individuals or groups of indi- 
 viduals who could not so easily evade the law. 
 A study of modern regulations will reveal the 
 fact that not dissimilar means are employed for 
 the same end. 
 
 ’ Parent-Ducliatelet cites regulations of Avignon of the 14th cen- 
 tury, which required that public women should be visited weekly by 
 a “barber.” The regulations in question are, however, undoubtedly 
 spurious. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 REGULATION OF PROSTITUTION IN PARIS 
 
 During the Middle Ages, prostitution was 
 tolerated in Paris as in all other important 
 cities of Central Europe. But with the ap- 
 pearance of the epidemic of syphilis toleration 
 ceased. The victim of that frightful malady 
 fell heir to all the cruel maltreatment that had 
 been the especial heritage of the leper. The 
 prostitute, as the natural medium of the dis- 
 ease, came to be regarded with horror and 
 hatred such as her mere moral delinquencies 
 have hardly ever inspired. The ancient laws 
 making prostitution a crime were restored, and 
 not until the end of the eighteenth century did 
 they cease to be enforced. 
 
 For a long time after the policy of expelling 
 the male syphilitic from society had given way 
 to the more rational policy of treating him, no 
 provision was made for the relief of unfortunate 
 prostitutes who were suffering from disease. 
 It was only accidentally that certain features 
 
 25 
 
26 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 were inserted in repressive laws which pointed 
 toward a system of sanitary control. As late 
 as 1657 it was the practice to exclude infected 
 prostitutes from the Salpetriere, where the 
 women charged with prostitution were con- 
 fined. As the system of inspection was im- 
 perfect, many who were diseased were found 
 among the prisoners. These were treated by 
 order of the authorities of the prison, although 
 this was strictly contrary to law. An edict of 
 1684 recognized the necessity of treating the 
 diseased. This provision is regarded as the 
 germ of the French sanitary control.^ 
 
 By the same law, the lieutenant of police 
 was given practically unlimited control over 
 prostitutes. He passed sentence, nor was 
 there any appeal from his decision. The 
 length of time during which the prostitutes 
 were imprisoned lay in his sole discretion. 
 The determination of the criteria whereby 
 a woman was judged guilty of debauch lay also 
 in his province, as appears from the preamble of 
 the law of July 26, 1713. It is easy to see in 
 this the germ of the discretionary power that 
 the police assume in dealing with prostitutes." 
 
 ' Parent-Duchatelet, op. cit., ii., 5 et seq. 
 
 Lecour, La Prostitution a Paris et a Londres. 407. 
 
Regulation in Paris 
 
 27 
 
 For the rest, an effort was to be made to 
 reform these women. They were to attend 
 mass and hear prayers read, etc. They were 
 treated, of course, as ordinary criminals : they 
 were dressed in prison uniform and fed on 
 prison fare and were compelled to perform 
 the hardest work of which they were capable. 
 
 By the law of 1713, above mentioned, the 
 determination of the facts of prostitution was 
 left to the royal commissaries or judges in the 
 several quarters of the city. These were to 
 receive as proof the declarations of the neigh- 
 bors. The pronouncing of sentence and the 
 discretionary power as to its severity still 
 remained with the lieutenant of police.^ 
 
 Such were the general regulations on the 
 subject of prostitution down to 1768. In that 
 year a royal ordinance decreed that prostitutes 
 found with the army should be arrested and 
 imprisoned by the military authorities unless’ 
 they were domiciled in the vicinity. In that 
 case they should be turned over to the civil 
 authorities for imprisonment. Before being 
 imprisoned, however, they were to be treated 
 for disease if found ill.^ 
 
 It is easy to see how the regulations of 1684, 
 
 ’ Lecour, op. eit., 409-410. ^ Lecour, op. cit., 41 1. 
 
28 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 supplemented by the ordinance of 1 768, should 
 become in effect a system of sanitary control. 
 The treatment previous to imprisonment was 
 compulsory ; the punishment lay in the dis- 
 cretion of the lieutenant of police. All that 
 was necessary was to make periodical arrests 
 with compulsory treatment and to discharge 
 those who were cured without imprisonment. 
 It appears that a system something like this 
 developed toward the end of the micien 
 rigime} 
 
 It was natural that the need for a system of 
 permanent registration should arise. The 
 first appearance of the idea of registration was 
 in 1 765. A police officer suggested in a report 
 to the lieutenant of police that the existing 
 disorder would be greatly diminished if all 
 public women were registered by the police. 
 It was rather with the hope of securing better 
 order than with a view to sanitary control 
 that the idea was then put forward. Some 
 years later another memoir emphasized the 
 sanitary bearing of registration. A commis- 
 sion was appointed to examine into the matter, 
 but it pronounced the scheme impracticable.’ 
 
 * Carlier, Les Deux Prostitutions^ 17. 
 
 * Reuss, La Prostitution, 231 et seq. 
 
Regulation in Paris 
 
 29 
 
 At the close of the reign of Louis XVI. the 
 plan was again taken up, and two agents were 
 ordered to proceed with the registration of 
 prostitutes. The Revolution, however, pre- 
 vented the order from being carried into effect. 
 The principles of the Revolution were too un- 
 compromising to permit of a policy so likely 
 to infringe upon individual liberty. 
 
 Not until 1798 were any preventive sanitary 
 measures taken. In that year a private physi- 
 cian undertook, under administrative patron- 
 age, the work of examining the prostitutes 
 actively engaged in their occupation. Ap- 
 parently, it was the understanding that he 
 should communicate to the police the state 
 of health of those whom he examined.^ 
 
 In 1802 the prefecture of police proceeded 
 to register public prostitutes and to impose 
 upon them the obligation of submitting to 
 fortnightly examination. Hitherto the courts 
 had decided whether or not a woman was 
 guilty of professional debauch ; now the police 
 proceeded to establish the facts in a purely 
 administrative way. The ardor for personal 
 liberty had cooled by this time so that no diffi- 
 culties were thrown in the way of the carrying 
 
 * Lecour, op. cit., 69. 
 
30 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 out of the plan of regulation. In 1805 a dis- 
 pensary was established for the treatment of 
 the diseased prostitutes. All expenses were 
 to be met by fees collected by the physicians 
 themselves. This system, it can easily be 
 understood, led to great abuses. The exam- 
 ining physicians took care to make their fees 
 as large as possible. Accordingly, in 1810, it 
 was found necessary to make a change in 
 this respect. The physicians were to report to 
 the cashier of the administration the names, 
 addresses, and the state of health of the women 
 examined. That official paid the physicians 
 and became responsible for the recovery of the 
 sums from the prostitutes.^ 
 
 By the second decade of the centur}" the 
 Parisian police had developed a plan which 
 they have cherished ever since — that of con- 
 fining prostitution to houses specially licensed 
 for that purpose. The difficulties that lay in 
 the way of controlling the conduct of the pros- 
 titute by dealing with her directly were found 
 to be almost insuperable. The keeper of a 
 brothel or a house of accommodation, however 
 low he may be morally, has nevertheless a 
 property stake that will keep him within the 
 
 ‘ Lecour, op. cit., 73. 
 
Regulation in Paris 
 
 31 
 
 bounds of the law. Prostitutes who were liv- 
 ing in isolated quarters were ordered to betake 
 themselves directly to the houses of accommo- 
 dation. Soliciting upon the streets was for- 
 bidden again and again, but the prohibition 
 was not capable of enforcement. 
 
 In 1828 the tax levied upon prostitutes for 
 meeting the expenses of sanitary control was 
 abolished. It had proven burdensome and 
 injurious. Half the time of the special agents 
 of the Morals Bureau was spent in hunting up 
 prostitutes who were delinquent in their pay- 
 ments. Moreover, it acted as a deterrent to 
 voluntary registration.^ 
 
 Up to 1828 the police registered as a li- 
 censed prostitute any woman who desired it. 
 No inquiries were made as to age, civil state, 
 or antecedents. Young girls arrested for de- 
 bauch were registered forthwith. According 
 to Parent-Duchatelet, the register of public 
 women contained the names of girls of ten, 
 who had, of course, never been engaged in vice. 
 In 1828 this outrageous policy ceased.^ 
 
 In 1 843 the service of moralswas reorganized. 
 The system then established is practically the 
 
 ' Parent-Duchatelet, op. cit., ii., 224. 
 
 * earlier, op. cit., 41. 
 
32 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 one now in force. It has also served as a 
 model for most of the systems of Europe. 
 
 Prostitution is tolerated either in licensed 
 brothels or in houses of accommodation where 
 prostitutes at large are compelled to resort. 
 Weekly examinations are imposed upon the 
 inmates of brothels ; these take place in the 
 licensed houses. The prostitutes at large are 
 obliged to appear once in two weeks at the 
 office provided by the police for that purpose. 
 Those found to be diseased are sent to the 
 hospital of the prison of St. Lazare, and are 
 not liberated until cured. 
 
 To insure a certain control over the con- 
 duct of these women, the keeper of a licensed 
 house (always a woman) is responsible for 
 good order in her establishment. A prosti- 
 tute who lives alone in a rented apartment 
 must own the furniture of the apartment, so 
 that it will not be easy for her to disappear 
 in case she has violated any of the regulations. 
 
 Women may be registered as prostitutes 
 either by order of the chief of the Morals 
 Bureau or at their own request. As a rule, 
 inscription is voluntary. Clandestine prostitu- 
 tion is punished severely enough to make it 
 worth while for the notoriously debauched to 
 
Regulation in Paris 33 
 
 avail themselves of the toleration offered by 
 the police. 
 
 Originally, little attention seems to have been 
 paid to the checking of the growth of vice. But 
 there has been an increasing tendency to refuse 
 the registration of minors. While this cannot 
 be done in every case, minors are registered 
 much less frequently now than formerly. The 
 tenants of licensed houses are forbidden to 
 admit boys under eighteen, or students of the 
 various higher schools. Great care is also 
 exercised in making it easy for a woman who 
 desires to reform to do so. 
 
 The control of prostitution is given over 
 almost entirely to a body of special agents 
 who form a part of the general secret service. 
 The ordinary police have nothing to do with 
 prostitution, except in case of gross violation 
 of public decency or public order. Between 
 forty and fifty agents are required for this 
 service. They must, of course, be men of 
 great tact, they must be men upon whom reli- 
 ance may be placed, since any mistake they 
 may make entails the most serious conse- 
 quences. 
 
 The medical service consisted in 1890 of 
 a chief and assistant-chief surgeon, fourteen 
 
34 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 surgeons in ordinary, and ten adjunct surgeons. 
 They are assigned to various quarters of the 
 city, changing at intervals by regular rotation. 
 
 The first thing that strikes the student of 
 the Parisian system is the weakness of its 
 legal basis. Since the Revolution, no general 
 laws on the subject of prostitution have been 
 made. The Penal Code does not touch upon 
 it. The police are therefore compelled to go 
 back to the Ordinances of 1684, 1713, 1768 
 and 1778 for their authority to regulate vice. 
 According to these ordinances, prostitution 
 was a crime, which the lieutenant of police 
 could punish at his discretion. Clandestine 
 prostitution is still punished according to 
 those ordinances.^ 
 
 The modern police are not, however, the 
 successors to the powers of the lieutenant of 
 police under the ancien rdgime. The lieuten- 
 ant of police could pass sentence if his royal 
 master authorized him to do so. The mod- 
 ern police commissary has no power to sen- 
 tence a criminal ; yet he appears to assume 
 such an authority with regard to the so-called 
 crime of debauch. 
 
 Another legal prop for the service of morals 
 
 * Cf. Riglement du ig Novembre 184.J, Sec. 7 . 
 
Regulation in Paris 
 
 35 
 
 is the law of 1789 constituting the municipali- 
 ties. By this law, the municipalities are 
 assured the advantages of a good police sys- 
 tem. The exact powers of the police are not 
 enumerated, but by a law of 1 790 it is speci- 
 fied that the police are to maintain public 
 order and decency and to protect public 
 health. It is assumed that this implies a 
 system of police regulation of prostitution.' 
 
 There have been numerous attempts to pass 
 general laws with regard to prostitution. In 
 1811 and in 1816, in 1819 and in 1823, emi- 
 nent administrators, lawyers and statesmen at- 
 tempted to formulate special laws that would 
 be appropriate to so delicate a subject. The 
 task had to be abandoned, however. It was 
 impossible to devise a law at once efficient and 
 just. And so the police have continued to 
 take matters into their own hands, changing 
 their regulations from time to time to suit the 
 exigencies of the occasion. 
 
 Doubtless the service of morals has gained 
 rather than lost by the flexibility thus attained. 
 But the lack of any other than a fictitious 
 legal basis has always been a point of attack 
 for the opponents of the system. While some 
 
 ^ Lecour, op. cit. , 29. 
 
36 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 of the supporters of the system of regulation 
 acquiesce in the absence of general laws, be- 
 lieving it beneath the dignity of the State to 
 notice a subject which is the cause of so many 
 cares for the police, the majority would look 
 with favor upon any measure which would free 
 the police from the serious charge of illegal 
 usurpation of powers. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 REGULATION IN BERLIN AND IN OTHER CITIES 
 OF EUROPE 
 
 Berlin. — The Reformation and the great 
 social and economic movements that were con- 
 nected with it wrought a complete change in 
 the character of the city of Berlin. From 
 a conservative mediaeval town, in which every 
 person had his fixed place, it had become a 
 large and wealthy city. The old regulations 
 concerning vice had been quite outgrown. Al- 
 though the old regulations, abolished at the 
 time of the Reformation, were restored when 
 the religious ardor had cooled, prostitution 
 was no longer easily controlled by them. It 
 had increased greatly in volume and in com- 
 plexity. The inference of contemporaries was 
 that the Reformation had thoroughly ruined 
 the morals of society — an inference accepted 
 by not a few modern writers. 
 
 In 1700 a system of regulation was adopted 
 which contained the essential features of mod- 
 
 37 
 
38 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 ern regulation. As one would expect, much 
 was borrowed from the Middle Ages. The 
 principle of dealing with groups of individuals 
 under a responsible head appears in the pro- 
 vision which makes the keeper of the brothel 
 responsible for the conduct of the inmates 
 of his house. If any outrage were perpetrated, 
 such as assault or robbery, the keeper had to 
 make good the damage done. If a woman, 
 known to be diseased, transmitted the malady, 
 the keeper had to stand the costs of treatment. 
 In this way it was thought possible to restrain 
 effectively all tendency toward disorder. 
 
 For the sake of preserving the health not 
 only of the prostitutes, but also of their visit- 
 ors, an official surgeon was to examine them 
 fortnightly. Those who were found to be dis- 
 eased were to be confined to their rooms, if the 
 malady were slight ; if it were grave, they were 
 to be sent to the Hospital of Charity. This 
 feature of the regulation is of course distinctly 
 a modern innovation. 
 
 Another thing that strikes one as distinctly 
 modern is the declaration that prostitution is 
 not permitted, but tolerated — a bit of sophistry 
 which marks a distinct advance over the naive 
 view of the Middle Ages. Instead of the medi- 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 39 
 
 aeval tax upon prostitutes as the possessors 
 of a lucrative trade, we find a fee of two Gro- 
 schen for medical examination. This, too, is 
 modern. It shows that even then there was a 
 feeling that it was dishonorable for the State 
 to accept the earnings of so foul a trade, ex- 
 cepting for the expenditure of regulating the 
 trade. One thing more that marks the regu- 
 lation as modern is the provision that, if a 
 prostitute wished to reform, the keeper of a 
 brothel could not detain her, even though she 
 owed him a debt.^ 
 
 This regulation remained in force until 1792. 
 With the growth of wealth and population, 
 vice had increased enormously. In 1780 there 
 were a hundred houses of ill fame, with seven 
 to nine inmates in each.^ There was, besides, 
 a class of prostitutes who lived in rented lodg- 
 ings and carried on their profession on their 
 own account. These also were tolerated by 
 the police, although the regulation of 1 700 had 
 made no provision for them. Moreover, clan- 
 destine prostitution throve, although the police 
 dealt with unlicensed prostitutes in summary 
 fashion, arresting them and registering them 
 
 * Behrend, Die Prostitution in Berlin, 20. 
 
 ’ Ibid., 26. 
 
40 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 without formalities, and compelling- them, under 
 severe penalties, to appear for sanitary exami- 
 nations. No special regard was had for the 
 age or condition of those thus inscribed upon 
 the register of infamy. Many of them were 
 mere children. 
 
 In 1792 a new regulation was made. This 
 was in many respects a mere amplification of 
 the regulation of 1700. Licensed houses of 
 prostitution were tolerated, as were also prosti- 
 tutes at large. This was strictly contrary to 
 the General Code {Allgemeines Landrecht'), 
 which prohibited prostitution excepting in 
 licensed houses. No attention was paid to 
 this fact at the time. 
 
 The principle of placing the prostitutes 
 under the control of persons who could be 
 responsible for their conduct was still further 
 developed. No one could open a brothel 
 without first receiving permission from the 
 police ; no one could rent a room to a pros- 
 titute without permission. As in the older 
 regulations, the tenant of the licensed house 
 was responsible for any outrage or robbery' 
 committed upon his premises. Moreover, he 
 was held to be an accomplice until he proved 
 his innocence. Even if it could be proven 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 41 
 
 that he was no partner to the outrage, he was 
 subject to fine and imprisonment if he had not 
 done everything in his power to prevent it. 
 Prostitutes at large were compelled to live in 
 certain streets. The person who let lodgings 
 to them (always an elderly woman, single, 
 widowed, or divorced) had to undertake re- 
 sponsibilities similar to those of the tenant of 
 a licensed house. 
 
 Much greater emphasis was laid upon the 
 sanitary feature of regulation. Any person 
 who should transmit a venereal disease was to 
 stand the cost of treatment and was subject to 
 imprisonment for three months. While this 
 provision applied to men as well as to women, 
 it is easy to see that in practice it would hardly 
 reach anyone except the prostitute. The 
 mistress of a brothel was held jointly respon- 
 sible with the inmate for any disease trans- 
 mitted, whether she knew that the disease 
 existed or not. She was also under obligation 
 to report at once any case of disease in her 
 house. If she failed to do so, she was subject 
 to fine and imprisonment. 
 
 The main sanitary measure was, however, 
 the periodic examinations by the official sur- 
 geons. These took place weekly, at the 
 
42 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 domicile of the prostitute. Those who were 
 diseased were disposed of as in the older reg- 
 ulation. To meet the expenses of treatment, 
 a contribution was laid upon all prostitutes. 
 As this proved insufficient, a tax was imposed 
 three years later upon the tenants of licensed 
 houses. 
 
 Much more attention than formerly was paid 
 to the moral welfare of the fallen woman. If 
 she wished to reform, she could not be de- 
 tained for any reason. Minors could be regis- 
 tered only in case they were already utterly 
 depraved.^ Of this the police were the 
 judges, since no girl could be admitted to a 
 brothel without permission. Severe penalties 
 were enacted against enticing young women 
 into brothels. 
 
 For the preservation of public decency, 
 soliciting in public places was prohibited, as 
 well as indecent proposals from windows or 
 doors of brothels. The brothel tenant or the 
 woman who had let a room to a prostitute 
 was responsible for the enforcement of this 
 regulation. Moreover, the sale of intoxi- 
 cating liquors in brothels was prohibited, and, 
 later, dancing and games, in order to pre- 
 
 * The age of majority was twenty-four. 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 43 
 
 vent vicious resorts from becoming places of 
 entertainment.^ 
 
 No provision was made for compulsory 
 registration. But the clandestine prostitute 
 was punished by three months’ imprisonment, 
 followed by confinement in the workhouse 
 until she should manifest a desire to enter 
 some honorable employment, and should find 
 an opportunity to do so. 
 
 This regulation remained practically un- 
 changed until 1828. It was not, however, 
 enforced with uniformity from year to year. 
 The ideas of the French Revolution permeated 
 German society to a certain extent, creating a 
 feeling that it was an outrage upon justice to 
 place a special class of human beings under 
 the arbitrary control of the police. More- 
 over, it was felt that the intimate relations of 
 the State with vice, which a system of regula- 
 tion naturally creates, were degrading. Not 
 only did this feeling exist in the general com- 
 munity, but it influenced not a little the min- 
 istry of the realm. Accordingly, the police of 
 Berlin were subjected to hostility from above 
 and below. In 1810 the ministry absolutely 
 prohibited the registration of minors, a practice 
 
 ’ Behrend, op. cit., 29 et seq. 
 
44 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 in which the police had hitherto persisted. 
 The police were forbidden to grant permits for 
 new brothels. They were to examine closely 
 into the antecedents of a woman who pro- 
 posed to enter a house of ill fame, and to 
 deter her from her purpose, if possible. 
 Against this tendency was the sentiment of 
 the army, which has generally been decidedly 
 in favor of a system of tolerated vice. The 
 military authorities at Berlin pleaded for the 
 removal of the age limitation imposed upon 
 those who wished to enter the ranks of regis- 
 tered prostitutes.^ 
 
 After the “ glorious victory ” the sentiment 
 against regulation diminished. In 1814 per- 
 mission was granted to register minors, al- 
 though an attempt was first to be made to 
 induce them to reform, and the consent of 
 their parents was to be secured. Permission 
 was also given to erect a new brothel in place 
 of one that had failed, and to transfer the 
 ownership of brothels. The consent of the 
 police was of course to be secured. 
 
 In 1829 a new regulation was made, with 
 the approval of the ministry. The only im- 
 portant change was the increased frequency of 
 
 ' Behrend, op. cit., go. 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 45 
 
 sanitary inspections. According to the new 
 regulation, they were to be made twice a week 
 instead of once. 
 
 At this time there were thirty-three licensed 
 houses in Berlin, These were pretty well 
 scattered throughout the city. There was no 
 formal restriction as to their location, except- 
 ing that they were not permitted in the vicin- 
 ity of churches and schools, or on crowded 
 thoroughfares. A considerable number of 
 them, however, were grouped together in a 
 small street, an der Konigsmauer. This street 
 had from a very early date been noted as a 
 haunt of vice. 
 
 During the thirties, citizens who possessed 
 property in the vicinity of brothels began to 
 complain to the police and the ministry of the 
 losses they suffered in consequence of the 
 presence of vice, and to petition for the re- 
 moval of the licensed houses. The police 
 authorities paid no attention to the petitions, 
 but in 1839 ^he ministry, again hostile to police 
 regulation, ordered the removal of all such 
 houses to the street an der Konigsmauer. 
 Accordingly, all were removed thither except 
 two. Five failed, leaving twenty-six licensed 
 houses in a street containing only fifty-two 
 
46 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 small houses. The street may fairly be said 
 to have been abandoned utterly to vice, since 
 its remaining inhabitants were largely panders 
 and procurers, together with the workers and 
 small traders who depended for support upon 
 the custom of the brothels. 
 
 This measure was, however, very far from 
 being satisfactory. It is a question whether 
 the existence of isolated brothels in various 
 parts of the city was as demoralizing as the 
 existence of a limited quarter in which vice 
 ran riot. Whatever may be said of the de- 
 moralizing effect upon respectable society of a 
 number of prostitutes mingling with it, there 
 can be no doubt that respectable surroundings 
 have far more power than police regulations to 
 keep the wanton woman from displaying the 
 actual degradation of her character. In a 
 limited community consisting wholly of im- 
 moral characters, in which respectable persons 
 normally appear only in moments of immoral- 
 ity, this restraining influence is absent. An 
 esprit de corps is created which is highly in- 
 jurious to public morals and public order.^ 
 Furthermore, the existence of licensed houses 
 side by side almost inevitably leads to an 
 
 • Behrend, op. cit., 114 et seq. 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 47 
 
 odious competition in indecency for the sake 
 of attracting customers. 
 
 From the point of view of sanitary regula- 
 tion, the plan was not successful. While the 
 notoriety of the quarter naturally attracted the 
 youthful and the reckless, the bands of stu- 
 dents and apprentices, the strangers bent upon 
 novelty, the publicity of it deterred those who 
 had acquired caution without acquiring con- 
 tinence, — the greatest resource of prostitu- 
 tion. Hence clandestine prostitution increased 
 throughout the city.^ 
 
 A further result of the grouping of licensed 
 houses was increased opposition toward any 
 system of regulation whatever. The agglom- 
 eration upon one spot of so much vice opened 
 the eyes of the better classes to the extent of 
 the evil. Accounts, exaggerated beyond all 
 semblance of truth, recalled the orgies of de- 
 clining Rome. The abolition sentiment again 
 gained credit with the higher authorities, and 
 in 1843 the ministry issued an order that one 
 half of the brothels an der Konigsmauer 
 should be removed beyond the Stadtmauer. 
 
 ’ This does not mean that prostitution in general increased. It 
 merely means that the relative proportion of those who would sub- 
 mit to regulation declined. 
 
48 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 All were to be subjected to close surveillance, 
 and for three violations of the regulations, 
 whether great or small, they were to be 
 closed, nor were others to be opened in their 
 place. The first part of the order was not 
 carried out, as the police declared that it was 
 impossible to find a locality which would re- 
 ceive the removed houses. Opportunity was 
 not given for carrying the second part of the 
 order into effect, as an order of the Minister 
 of the Interior, issued in 1844, fixed January 
 I, 1846, as the date for the closing of all 
 the brothels in Berlin. This order was duly 
 executed. 
 
 It is not to be supposed that a let-alone 
 policy was adopted. The police were ordered 
 to take all needful measures for public safety 
 and public health. Prostitutes were still com- 
 pelled to submit to weekly medical inspec- 
 tions. A register was kept showing the state 
 of health of the women, but no control-book 
 was given them, and it was to be impressed 
 upon them that they were not licensed, but 
 merely tolerated. Clandestine prostitution 
 was still subject to severe punishment. Doubt- 
 less the police enforced the changed regula- 
 tions with no very great enthusiasm ; but, so 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 49 
 
 far as the formal regulations were concerned, 
 the only change was the abolition of the 
 brothel and its replacement by tolerated pros- 
 titution at large. There is no ground what- 
 ever for the notion that all sanitary control 
 was abandoned in 1846. 
 
 At the instigation of the military authorities, 
 the licensed houses were opened again in 1851. 
 The Penal Code of 1850 imposed the penalty 
 fixed for procuring upon anyone who should 
 act as a mediator for professional vice or lend 
 his aid to vicious practices.^ 
 
 Another section, however, implied the right 
 on the part of the police to make needful reg- 
 ulations for the preservation of public health 
 and public order,^ 
 
 It was upon the latter section that the 
 police based the right of reopening the broth- 
 els. In 1856, however, a decision of the Ober- 
 tribunal of Prussia pronounced the brothel 
 an illegal institution, whereupon the licensed 
 houses of Berlin were definitely closed.® 
 
 The “ service of morals ” as reorganized in 
 1850 and again in 1876 did not differ essen- 
 
 * Sec. J46. ■ Sec. i^j. 
 
 * Blaschko, Conference internationale, Brussels, i 8 gg ; EnquHes, 
 
 i., 662. 
 
 4 
 
50 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 tially from the system now in force. We may 
 accordingly pass at once to the existing regu- 
 lations. The sanitary feature is paramount. 
 The registration of prostitutes is merely aux- 
 iliary to sanitary control, since it is absolutely 
 necessary to register the women of loose life 
 if they are to be subjected to periodical ex- 
 amination. A woman may be registered either 
 at her own request or by the order of the 
 chief of the police bureau. The police arrest 
 any woman whom they have reason to suspect 
 of clandestine prostitution. The grounds of 
 such arrest may be direct observation by the 
 special police agents of the service of morals, 
 the denunciation of private persons, of regis- 
 tered prostitutes, or of men who believe them- 
 selves to be contaminated by the woman in 
 question. When arrested, she is subjected to 
 a physical examination, and if found to be 
 diseased the police assume the power to place 
 her upon the register. If she is not diseased, 
 she receives a “kindly warning.” In the 
 warning-formula, especial emphasis is laid upon 
 the fact that a second arrest would mean com- 
 pulsory registration. It is assumed that if a 
 mistake has been made in the first arrest, the 
 woman arrested will take such pains to avoid 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 51 
 
 further suspicion that a second mistake would 
 be practically impossible. 
 
 Once registered, prostitutes are required to 
 report every week at the public dispensary for 
 sanitary examination. Failure to do so is 
 punishable by imprisonment, the maximum 
 sentence being six weeks. Examinations and 
 treatment are gratuitous. 
 
 Every registered prostitute must give satis- 
 factory information as to age and antecedents. 
 Minors are not, as a rule, permitted to register. 
 
 There are of course numerous detailed reg- 
 ulations with regard to the localities where 
 prostitutes may not appear, and with regard 
 to the manner in which they must deport 
 themselves. These it is unnecessary to discuss 
 here. 
 
 Comparison of Reglementation Systems of 
 Paris and Berlin . — If we compare the systems 
 of Paris and of Berlin, we find that they do not 
 differ greatly in essence. In both of them 
 prostitutes are treated as a special class, bear- 
 ing a relation to the common law essentially 
 different from that of other members of society. 
 A renowned Erench lawyer has clearly defined 
 this point of view by declaring that prostitution 
 is a status in the same sense that the army is a 
 
52 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 status, and, just as is the case with the army, 
 prostitutes may be subjected to regulations 
 that would be tyrannical if applied to the 
 ordinary citizend 
 
 In Berlin this manner of regarding prostitu- 
 tion has been handed down from the Middle 
 Ages, and may be considered a survival of a 
 social system in which any body of individuals 
 could be treated as a special status. In Paris 
 it has rather grown up as a result of the exi- 
 gencies of police administration. 
 
 In both cities the need is recognized of a 
 
 o 
 
 special body of police, acting with large dis- 
 cretionary powers. In both cities the sanitary 
 features of control are paramount ; neverthe- 
 less, public order, decency and morals receive 
 a certain attention. The Berlin authorities 
 act, perhaps, with greater freedom in imposing 
 registration upon prostitutes who will not 
 submit to it voluntarily. This is probably 
 owing to the greater legal authority which the 
 Berlin police possess. 
 
 Much regard has been usually paid to the 
 fact that in Paris it is the policy of the police 
 to confine prostitution to licensed houses, while 
 in Berlin the brothel is absolutely prohibited. 
 
 ’ M. Dupin, cited by Lecour, op. cit., 41. 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 53 
 
 How unimportant this feature is may be under- 
 stood from the fact that not one tenth of the 
 registered prostitutes of Paris live in licensed 
 houses/ In practice, the administrations of 
 the two cities have exactly the same problem 
 to deal with. 
 
 There are, of course, innumerable minor 
 regulations that show certain differences in 
 policy. I'hese, however, are of small interest 
 to anyone except the officials who have to 
 administer the systems. 
 
 Finally, the sanitary service does not differ 
 in essence. It is true that all examinations 
 in Berlin are held in public offices designed 
 for that purpose, while in Paris those who 
 live in licensed houses are examined at their 
 domicile. This difference is of small signifi- 
 cance, since the proportion of brothel inmates 
 is so insignificant. In Berlin examinations are 
 weekly, in Paris fortnightly. Examination 
 and treatment are gratuitous in both cities. 
 
 Regulation in Other European Cities . — A 
 study of the evolution of regulation in other 
 European cities would reveal but few new 
 
 * In 1897, out of about 6000 registered prostitutes only 490 lived in 
 licensed houses. — Dr. Ozenne, Conference internationale, Brussels, 
 1899 ; Enquetes, i., 146. 
 
54 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 features. Regulation has in general grown 
 out of repressive legislation. Inability to 
 enforce stringent measures against vice has 
 generally given the policy of the police an 
 arbitrary character that was easily changed 
 into discretionary power. Sanitary features 
 have been grafted upon systems of tacit tolera- 
 tion. As a rule, Paris and Berlin have served 
 as models in this respect. Later systems, as 
 the regulations of Italy, were modelled after 
 that of Brussels, which in turn is in essence a 
 copy of the Parisian system. 
 
 It may, perhaps, be worth while to touch upon 
 a few of the peculiar features to be found 
 in some of the other cities of Europe. Thus 
 we find in Bremen the plan of confining pros- 
 titution to a single small street, which is so 
 situated as to be easily controlled by the 
 police. Prostitutes found elsewhere are ar- 
 rested and punished by imprisonment. This 
 plan has been partially adopted by several 
 other of the smaller German cities. A similar 
 policy is pursued in some of the smaller 
 French cities. 
 
 No very large city has adopted such a 
 policy. It seems probable that the enormous 
 proportions such a quarter would assume in a 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 55 
 
 city like Paris or Berlin would be a menace to 
 good order and a centre of demoralization. 
 Where special quarters exist, it would seem 
 that the interest of property owners in the 
 vicinity of licensed houses, rather than a con- 
 sideration of the moral interests of the com- 
 munity as a whole, was responsible for their 
 creation. 
 
 In a large number of the cities of France, 
 the police persist in attempting to confine 
 prostitution to licensed houses. In some 
 cities their efforts are not wholly unsuccess- 
 ful. Thus in Marseilles the licensed houses 
 hold their own. In other cities these houses 
 are constantly declining. These differences 
 are to be explained by the character of the 
 clientage of prostitution. Where strangers 
 are numerous, where sailors are accustomed 
 to land, the licensed house thrives. It is the 
 “ law of supply and demand ” that decides 
 whether the efforts of the police can be fruitful 
 or not. 
 
 Vienna presents several peculiarities in the 
 system of regulation of vice. The Morals 
 police and the Sanitary police are under dif- 
 ferent authorities. The supervision of public 
 morals falls in the province of the Imperial 
 
5 ^ 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 police, while for the sanitary control the mu- 
 nicipal authorities are responsible. As a con- 
 sequence, there is a lack of harmony, the 
 Sanitary police attempting to increase as far 
 as possible the number of public prostitutes, 
 the Morals police attempting to limit it. Ex- 
 aminations of licensed women are made by or- 
 dinary physicians, designated by the police. 
 They are made either at the domicile of the 
 physician or at that of the woman. They are 
 thus designed to give as little publicity to the 
 activities of police control as circumstances 
 allow. 
 
 Extent of Regulation . — Regulation of vice 
 is still properly in the experimental stage. 
 Many believe, it is true, that its salutary ef- 
 fects are not to be challenged ; others afhrm 
 that no such effects are to be found. It is 
 accordingly necessary, as preliminary' to ex- 
 amining the evidence as to the efficacy of 
 regulation, to consider the extent of existing 
 regulations. 
 
 In the first place, practically all the cities 
 and large towns of France have systems of 
 regulation much like that of Paris. So also 
 have the cities of Belgium. German cities, as 
 a rule, regulate vice. Hungary has what is 
 
In Berlin and Other Cities 
 
 57 
 
 considered an efficient system ; Austrian cities 
 regulate vice, but in no very efficient way. 
 For the last half century, Russian cities have 
 persistently striven to keep prostitution under 
 sanitary control. From the time of the union 
 of Italy down to 1888, the larger Italian cities 
 had a system of regulation modelled after that 
 of Brussels. The Scandinavian states, with 
 the exception of Norway, regulate vice in 
 their largest cities ; so also do Spain and 
 Portugal. From 1866 until 1883, England 
 tried the experiment of regulation in twelve 
 districts in England and two in Ireland. In 
 these stations prostitutes were registered and 
 subjected to periodic sanitary inspection, and 
 if diseased were detained in lock-hospitals 
 until cured. 
 
 Outside of Europe similar regulations have 
 been put in force. The most notorious were 
 the regulations in India during the time of 
 the Contagious Diseases Acts. Hong Kong 
 also presented a system of regulation. In 
 Japan prostitutes are confined to special quar- 
 ters and are subjected to periodic examina- 
 tions. Finally, mention may be made of the 
 one experiment in our own country, in St. 
 Louis, 1870-1873. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE SANITARY ASPECT OF MODERN REGULATION 
 
 The effect of vice upon the physical health 
 of the community is receiving at present more 
 attention than any other feature of the prob- 
 lem. Reglementists and abolitionists alike 
 test their systems by the effect upon venereal 
 disease. Nothing could be more natural, since 
 it has at last become clear to almost everyone 
 that venereal diseases are frightfully common 
 in every civilized country. Moreover, recent 
 progress in medical science has demonstrated 
 the fact that the diseases that have long been 
 known to be the immediate effects of vice by 
 no means make up the sum of the cost in 
 health that results from it. Many constitu- 
 tional maladies that were formerly ascribed to 
 entirely different causes have recently been 
 shown to be of venereal origin. 
 
 Unfortunately, it is impossible to form even 
 an approximately correct idea of the actual ex- 
 tent of the ravag-es of venereal disease. One 
 
 o 
 
 58 
 
Sanitary Aspect of Regulation 59 
 
 medical congress after another has urged the 
 necessity of adequate statistics of venereal dis- 
 ease ; but up to the present very little has 
 been accomplished in this direction. In Nor- 
 way alone are private physicians required by 
 law to furnish reports of the cases treated by 
 them. Everywhere else it is necessary to de- 
 duce the facts in question from the statistics 
 of limited classes, such as the army and the 
 navy, to piece together hospital records, or to 
 depend upon the estimates of individual 
 physicians.^ 
 
 We may take as a starting-point the Nor- 
 wegian statistics, since, with all their imperfec- 
 tions, they are the most complete in existence. 
 
 In Christiania, a city of over two hundred 
 thousand inhabitants, during the period from- 
 1879 to 1898, the yearly number of cases of 
 venereal diseases of all kinds reported have 
 ranged generally between ten and fifteen per 
 thousand of population. The minimum was 
 5.7 in 1888; the maximum was 20.7 in 1882. 
 
 ’ The Medical Department of Prussia has within the last year un- 
 dertaken to secure statistics of venereal disease in the State of Prus- 
 sia. A circular was issued by the Minister, April 30, 1901, requesting 
 all physicians to report all cases treated by them during the current 
 year . — Bulletin de la Soci/td Internationale de Prophylaxie Sanitaire 
 et Morale, Tome i., No. 3. 
 
6o 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 Of these, about two-fifths are cases of gonor- 
 rhcea ; rather more than three-tenths are cases 
 of syphilis. 
 
 For the whole of Norway during the same 
 period, the number of cases of venereal dis- 
 ease has varied from 2.14 per thousand in 1889 
 to 3.55 in 1882.^ 
 
 These figures are unquestionably too low. 
 Many cases of disease are naturally treated by 
 quacks, or by the patients themselves accord- 
 ing to recipes borrowed from comrades. 
 Again, although there is a law compelling 
 every physician to report all cases, it is impos- 
 sible to enforce such a law. The only motive 
 that would induce a physician to comply with 
 the law is scientific interest. 
 
 While cases of hereditary syphilis are re- 
 ported, it is obvious that many will escape 
 through insufficient scientific knowledge on the 
 part of practising physicians. Finally, there is 
 no place for the legacy of criminality, idiocy 
 and other forms of degeneracy that venereal 
 disease entails upon society. 
 
 On the other hand, many of the persons dis- 
 eased may be treated for several maladies dur- 
 ing the same year, or for different phases of 
 
 ’ Holst, Conf^ence Internationale, Brussels, 1899; Enquetes, i., 126. 
 
Sanitary Aspect of Regulation 6i 
 
 the same disease. Especially would this be 
 true of prostitutes, who are, of course, included 
 in the population at large. This would tend 
 to make the number of venereally diseased 
 seem greater than it actually is. Sufferers 
 from such diseases are very apt to change their 
 physicians ; and this also would tend to make 
 the figures too large. 
 
 Accordingly, these statistics can be consid- 
 ered as an indication only of the actual extent 
 of disease. Nevertheless, it seems true that 
 far the greater proportion of the ills resulting 
 from vice are recognizable by competent phy- 
 sicians. Christiania is a city in which, for half 
 a century, much attention has been given to 
 combating venereal disease. It may be as- 
 sumed, then, that its physicians will generally 
 have interest enough to report cases of disease 
 according to law. 
 
 Where military service is compulsory, the 
 state of health of the army will show something 
 as to the extent of disease in population, since 
 every able-bodied adult male must serve. The 
 following table will show the extent of venereal 
 diseases in various European armies ^ : 
 
 ’ Blaschko, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Enquites, 
 i., 681. 
 
62 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 
 German 
 
 F rench 
 
 Austrian 
 
 Italian 
 
 
 per 1000 
 
 per 1000 
 
 per 1000 
 
 per 1000 
 
 1881-86 
 
 35-1 
 
 58.2 
 
 73.6 
 
 102.9 
 
 1886-91 
 
 27.1 
 
 51.1 
 
 65.3 
 
 94.3 
 
 1891-96 
 
 29.1 
 
 56.7 
 
 61.0 
 
 84.9 
 
 As data 
 
 for estimating the general 
 
 preva- 
 
 lence of disease, these figures are, of course, to 
 be used with a good deal of caution. The 
 pay of the soldiers, the character of the disci- 
 pline, the location of the barracks, and a num- 
 ber of other considerations must be allowed 
 for before one can venture to affirm that 
 venereal diseases are more common in Italy 
 than in Germany. It is to be expected that 
 disease will be much more frequent among 
 soldiers than among citizens, owing to the 
 fact that the soldiers are young and unmar- 
 ried, free from arduous exertion, and exposed 
 to the demoralizing influences that always 
 pervade military bodies. 
 
 When an army consists of volunteers, as 
 the British army, statistics of venereal disease 
 cease to have any value as an indication of 
 the general state of health. It is not the 
 typical British citizen who enlists in time of 
 peace. 
 
 Where large standing armies do not exist, 
 it is necessary to rely upon the records of 
 
Sanitary Aspect of Regulation 63 
 
 hospitals and the estimates of physicians. 
 The records of hospitals are worth little, as 
 but a fraction of the diseased ever apply for 
 admission. The estimates of physicians are 
 of course mere guesses, most often evolved 
 in the heat of argument, and hence worth 
 practically nothing. 
 
 But however imperfect the data for estimat- 
 ing the true extent of the evil may be, they 
 are sufficient to justify the opinion that vene- 
 real disease is one of the most serious that 
 menace public health, and that no less ener- 
 getic measures should be taken to stamp it 
 out than are employed to check the ravages 
 of other serious contagious diseases. Even 
 if the shame and suffering which these mala- 
 dies cause the individual are left out of ac- 
 count, there is no question that the burden 
 which they impose upon society at large is a 
 heavy one. Even if they do not utterly wreck 
 the health of the individual, they impair his 
 industrial efficiency and increase the chance of 
 his becoming a burden upon society. In the 
 long contest for survival among different na- 
 tions, a high percentage of venereal diseases 
 is a most serious handicap for any country. 
 It is the duty of a community to do every- 
 
64 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 thing in its power to disembarrass itself of 
 them. 
 
 But the question whether society owes it to 
 the individual to protect him from venereal 
 infection has long been a subject of bitter 
 controversy. It is a common idea that, since 
 such maladies are generally the result of im- 
 moral acts, the persons infected receive merely 
 their due. They have knowingly exposed 
 themselves to the danger ; they have violated 
 social laws in order to do so ; let them take 
 the consequences. 
 
 Another view, one which bears the stamp 
 of modern evolutionary science, recognizes the 
 fact that there are individuals so constituted 
 as to be unable to control their animal in- 
 stincts. These are, as it were, fatally devoted 
 to expose themselves to contagion. There can 
 be no talk of free moral agency on the part of 
 such persons ; one cannot regard the misfor- 
 tune that befalls them as a punishment for 
 their acts. Such persons are, however, unfit 
 members of civilized society, and venereal dis- 
 ease merely acts to free society from their 
 presence. 
 
 The latter view is the more easily disposed of. 
 It is not merely the incompetent, the degener- 
 
Sanitary Aspect of Regulation 65 
 
 ate, the brutal, that fall victims to the scourge 
 of syphilis. The upper classes and the lower 
 suffer alike. In Russian cities, it is said to be 
 the very flower of the youth, the young men 
 in the Universities, who are most frequently 
 diseased. Similar observations have been 
 made with regard to other European coun- 
 tries. Doubtless there is some exaggeration 
 in such statements as these. But any prac- 
 tising physician will bear witness to the fact 
 that among his patients the “unfit” form no 
 considerable fraction. 
 
 The other view deserves more extended 
 consideration. It is an undeniable fact that, 
 in the great majority of cases, venereal dis- 
 ease is contracted as the result of a voluntary 
 act, — an act known by everyone to be im- 
 moral. It is only natural to regard disease as 
 a penalty for vicious conduct. In this respect 
 there is certainly a valid distinction between 
 venereal diseases on the one hand and all 
 other contagious or infectious diseases on the 
 other. An individual has a right to demand 
 all possible protection from evils which he 
 cannot avoid ; his right to protection from 
 dangers which he voluntarily encounters is 
 not so clear. 
 
66 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 Yet it is easy to carry the principle of per- 
 sonal responsibility for voluntary acts to an 
 unwarranted extreme. The boy who yields 
 to immoral impulses does not deserve the 
 same penalty that falls upon the man of 
 matured intelligence who lapses from virtue. 
 The influence of the environment must be 
 taken into account in judging the degree of 
 personal responsibility. Now, it is well known 
 that venereal disease is frequently contracted 
 at a very early age. A considerable portion 
 of the syphilitics treated in hospitals are boys 
 still in their teens. Probably a majority of 
 all sufferers from syphilis are infected before 
 the twenty-sixth year.^ 
 
 The penalty of disease, then, falls most 
 heavily upon those who are least responsible 
 for their acts. Accordingly, it is easy to see 
 why many thinkers who are not in the least 
 inclined to condone immorality look upon 
 sanitary control of vice as of paramount im- 
 portance. So long as society permits men to 
 grow up in an environment inimical to virtue, 
 
 ' Of 10,000 syphilitics who came under the observation of Professor 
 Fournier, 817 had been infected before the twentieth year, and 
 5130 between twenty-one and twenty-six . — Conference InterTiationale, 
 Brussels, 1899 ; Rapports Preiirninaires, 41. 
 
Sanitary Aspect of Regulation 67 
 
 they argue, it is idle to hold them strictly 
 accountable for their conduct, and inhuman to 
 permit them to suffer from diseases which 
 might be prevented by systematic sanitary 
 regulation. 
 
 There is one further fact which would seem 
 to condemn the public policy of ignoring ve- 
 nereal diseases. Great numbers of people 
 suffer from them by no moral fault of their 
 own. It is, perhaps, not as well known as it 
 should be, that men frequently transmit to 
 their wives diseases contracted in their youth 
 and folly, of which they believed them- 
 selves to be quite cured. It requires much 
 moral cold-bloodedness to take the stand 
 that this is merely a matter between husband 
 and wife, with which society has nothing to 
 do.^ 
 
 Account must also be taken of the children 
 brought into the world with the curse of 
 hideous disease upon them ; of the nurse 
 contaminated by the child she nurtures ; of the 
 child diseased through its nurse ; and of the 
 
 ' Professor Fournier found that of one hundred women infected 
 with syphilis, twenty had been contaminated by their husbands. — 
 Conference Internationale^ Brussels, 1899 ; Rapports Preiiminaires, 
 i., 13. See also Flesch, Prostitution und Frauenkrankheiten. 
 
68 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 numbers of persons who are infected by ac- 
 cidental contact/ 
 
 * In some places, syphilitic disease is regularly contracted in such 
 ways. According to the data at hand, as much as 8o per cent, 
 of the syphilis among the Russian rural population is contracted 
 thus. Even in the city population, extra-genital infection is respon- 
 sible for from 1.5 to 3 per cent. This does not include hereditary 
 syphilis. — O. V. Petersen, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; 
 Enquites, i., 264. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE MORAL ASPECT OF REGULATION 
 
 The prominence given in recent discussion 
 to the sanitary evils that result from un- 
 checked and unregulated prostitution has 
 obscured, to a certain extent, the fact that 
 there are greater evils than physical disease 
 connected with vice. One who subscribes to 
 the dictum, “ Disease is a great evil, but vice 
 is a greater,” is almost certain to be subjected 
 to the scorn of many practical men. Yet, 
 when the controversial spirit subsides, all 
 rational men will admit the gravity of vice, 
 quite apart from its hygienic consequences. 
 The history of decadent Greece and Rome 
 will show to what depths of imbecility and 
 shame it may cause a nation to fall. There 
 can be no greater mistake than to believe that 
 the impulses that lead to vice are constant 
 and invariable, capable of complete satiation. 
 They grow with feeding ; if they are wearied 
 with one kind of satisfaction, they seek not 
 
 69 
 
70 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 rest, but variety. This fact, rather than any 
 other, will account for the hideous forms of 
 vice that disfigured ancient society. One 
 does not need a revealed religion or a subtle 
 moral philosophy to teach him that unre- 
 strained vice results in mental and moral dis- 
 ease and degeneracy far more hideous and far 
 more dangerous to society than any form of 
 physical disease. 
 
 Accordingly, if it is a dangerous policy for 
 government to ignore the existence of venereal 
 diseases and to neglect any possible means 
 for preventing them, it is a still more danger- 
 ous policy to ignore vice and to permit it to 
 grow unchecked. To limit the number of 
 those who seek vicious pleasures, and to pre- ^ 
 vent the furnishing of such pleasures to those 
 who are inclined to seek them, is one of the 
 first duties of good government. 
 
 There is a widely-prevalent opinion that the 
 moral task is too great for Government to 
 undertake, while sanitary improvements may 
 be easily brought about ; accordingly, it is 
 expedient to limit governmental activity to 
 the comparatively narrow field of sanitar}^ 
 regulation. Those who hold this view lose 
 sight of the fact that humanity is not divided 
 
The Moral Aspect of Regulation 71 
 
 into two classes, the virtuous and the vicious, 
 but that in it is represented every degree of 
 virtue and vice, from the purest to the most 
 utterly depraved. There will probably always 
 be men who are swayed solely by animal pas- 
 sions, and it would be vain to hope to make \ 
 them virtuous by legislative enactment. There ' 
 will always be women who fall willing vic- 
 tims to vice, whom no governmental vigilance 
 could save. A great part of vice withdraws 
 itself as completely from social control as do V' 
 a man’s secret thoughts. The fact remains 
 that the greater part of humanity stands mid- 
 way between the two extremes and may be^ 
 improved or degraded in morals by circum- 
 stances which lie within the control of society. 
 
 Indeed, it is almost inexplicable that anyone 
 should doubt that a more rational system of 
 education, better housing conditions, the sup^ 
 pression of flagrant incitement to vice, and the 
 dissociating of vice from legitimate amuse- 
 ment would diminish the number of patrons 
 of prostitution, and would limit the extent to 
 which the remainder indulge in illicit pleasures. 
 The improvement in morals could not, of 
 course, be very pronounced in its effects. A 
 large part of the gain could appear only in a 
 
72 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 succeeding generation, yit would certainly be 
 worth none the less for that. It may be re- 
 marked that there is hardly a reputable de- 
 fender of sanitary regulation who does not at 
 the same time advocate measures of moral 
 reform. The influence of pernicious surround- 
 ings in promoting immorality is everywhere 
 recognized. Some writers expect much good 
 from measures that tend to promote morality 
 among men, but believe that nothing can be 
 done to diminish the number of women who 
 lead immoral lives. This is the view of 
 Tarnowsky. It rests upon the theory of the 
 innate perversity of all prostitutes, a theory 
 which is not borne out by the facts. Without 
 doubt, congenital perverts do exist among 
 women. But there is no reason for believing 
 that they form more than a negligible fraction 
 of the entire number of prostitutes. 
 
 A very large number of prostitutes begin 
 their career of shame when mere children. 
 They may be the victims of procurers, or they 
 may drift into vice without the deliberate in- 
 citement of any person who expects to profit 
 from their shame. In any case, they can hardly 
 be held responsible for their vicious conduct. 
 
 It is a disgrace to civilization that panders 
 
The Moral Aspect of Regulation 73 
 
 are still permitted to betray neglected children 
 and to take part of their earnings. In every 
 large city those who have been attracted into 
 prostitution before they were old enough to be 
 responsible for their acts make up a very large 
 proportion of the total numberof viciouswomen. 
 
 It is undoubtedly true that a chronic state of 
 poverty has a powerful influence in impelling 
 women to accept a vicious life. Society has 
 up to the present time proven unable to solve 
 the problem of poverty ; and until that problem 
 is solved, there is little reason to believe that 
 there will cease to be a class of women, not 
 necessarily congenitally defective, who will 
 choose a life of vice. But there are in every 
 large city classes of working women whose 
 normal income is sufficient to permit them to 
 live honorable lives, but who are left at times 
 of temporary depression with no means of 
 escaping from starvation except prostitution.^ 
 
 It is easily conceivable that society could 
 furnish temporary relief to such unfortunates 
 
 ’ According to Conference Ititernationale, Brtissels, 1899 ; 
 
 Enquetes, i., 676, occasional prostitution far surpasses in extent pro- 
 fessional prostitution in the great industrial centres of Germany. 
 In such cities prostitution increases or diminishes inversely as em- 
 ployment in industry. In St. Petersburg it is common for domestics 
 to practise prostitution vi'hen out of employment and to cease from 
 it when work is offered. — Stilrmer, Die Proslitntioji in Russland, 76. 
 
74 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 and thus diminish, to an appreciable extent, the 
 volume of feminine vice. 
 
 Again, there still remains a class of women 
 who are abducted and forced into prostitution 
 by physical violence. The fact that they 
 sooner or later accept their fate is the only thing 
 that can account for the indifference of society 
 towdrd such a shameful condition. This is cer- 
 tainly a factor within the control of Government. 
 
 The possibilities of moral regulation are by 
 no means exhausted when society has done all 
 in its power to prevent women from entering 
 upon a life of shame. It is a long-exploded 
 fallacy that a woman who has once fallen must 
 always remain in the lowest degradation of 
 vice. Of the great numbers who have fallen 
 through need or thoughtlessness, probably the 
 majority are striving to rise out of the mire, 
 ^t is a commonplace that modern prostitution, 
 viewed as a whole, is a temporary, not a per-V^ 
 manent state. After a few years of shame the 
 greater number of these women return to 
 honorable employment, mari^", or become kept 
 mistresses,^ a station degraded enough, to be 
 
 * Ehlers, Confirence Intertiationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Enquetes, i., 
 
 98 et seq. j Schmolder, Conference International, Brussels, 1899; 
 Rapports Prlliminaires j Jeannel, La Prostitution dans les grandes 
 Villes du dixneuvilme Sihle, 263. 
 
The Moral Aspect of Regulation 75 
 
 
 sure, but infinitely less degraded than that of 
 the public prostitute. 
 
 Even among the registered prostitutes of 
 large European cities, there are many who are 
 each year liberated from the control of the 
 police, on the ground that they have ceased to 
 prostitute themselves. Thus, in Copenhagen, 
 from 1871 to 1896, twenty per cent, of the 
 registered prostitutes were cancelled from the 
 register because of marriage, thirteen per cent 
 returned to their relatives, and ten per cent, 
 were taken in charge by private persons (insti- 
 tutions, etc.).^ Of course, this would be much 
 more frequently the case with occasional pros- 
 titutes, who have not formed the habits of a 
 vicious life. 
 
 When the fact that prostitutes can and do 
 reform is taken into account, it becomes evi- 
 dent that Government has not performed all 
 its duty as a moralizing force until it has done 
 everything in its power to make reform possible 
 for those who desire it. The very least that 
 common morality can demand is that no ob-|^ 
 Stacie should be placed in the way of the unfor-*^ 
 tunates who are struggling to reform. 
 
 * Ehlers, Conference Internationale^ Brussels^ 1899; EnquiteSy i., 
 
 121. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 FUNDAMENTAL OPPOSITION BETWEEN MORAL AND 
 SANITARY CONTROL 
 
 It is not difficult to understand that the 
 sanitary and moral interests in the control 
 of prostitution cannot be wholly in harmony 
 with each other. Some features of sanitary 
 control may be equally salutary morally, and 
 vice versa. Others may at least be indifferent 
 morally, and so create no real opposition be- 
 tween the two groups of interests. But un- 
 questionably many regulations which may be 
 very good from a sanitary point of view are 
 evil from the point of view of morals. And 
 the reverse is likewise true. 
 
 It is not an accident that in Paris, where the 
 sanitary branch of the service has been grafted 
 upon the Morals Police proper, and is still 
 subordinate to it, there should be constant 
 friction between the medical men and the 
 police. The police, as guardians of public 
 morals, do not find it possible to put into force 
 
 76 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 77 
 
 measures that the physicians consider abso- 
 lutely essential. This is still more the case in 
 Austria, where the two branches are indepen- 
 dent of each other. The complaint is fre- 
 quently made by the sanitary branch that the 
 morals branch pursues its own ends, quite re- 
 gardless of sanitary considerations. A learned 
 Austrian writer has laid down the axiom that 
 the less the attention that is paid to public 
 morality, the better will be the state of public 
 health, and vice versa} 
 
 The reason for this opposition lies upon the 
 surface. Since venereal diseases are always 
 the result of contagion, it is evident that if all 
 those who are diseased could be isolated, and 
 kept under treatment until entirely cured, 
 venereal disease would disappear. But it is 
 manifestly impossible to discover all cases of 
 disease in the general population and to treat 
 the patients discovered in isolation. Since, 
 however, venereal disease is usually directly or 
 indirectly traceable to prostitution, if prosti- 
 tutes could be kept free from it, it would 
 eventually disappear from society. To attain 
 this end it would be necessary to discover 
 every case of disease as soon as it appears, 
 
 ' Schrank, Die Prostitution in Wien, ii., 126. 
 
78 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 and to confine the patient until the disease is 
 wholly cured. And this implies, of course, a 
 rigid police control over every woman who 
 sells the use of her person, whether publicly 
 or not, — a control sufficient to compel her to 
 submit to very frequent sanitary inspection, 
 and to a long and tedious imprisonment when- 
 ever she is infected with disease. Naturally, 
 the most violent opposition on the part of 
 the prostitute must be expected. For several 
 reasons, the periodic examinations are irksome 
 to her ; still more irksome is compulsory treat- 
 ment, since the diseases with which she is 
 infected may not be painful to her, and she 
 cares not a whit whether she transmits them 
 to her clients or not, — no more than do her 
 clients care whether they transmit disease to 
 her. According to this system of regulation, 
 the police would treat her much as a chattel, 
 and would keep her in good health for her 
 clients’ sake. 
 
 It is the habit of many who advocate such a 
 system of regulation to paint all prostitutes 
 as hideous, blear-eyed, degenerate creatures, 
 recognizable at a glance, detestable to all, even 
 to their “ consumers,” stained through and 
 through with every form of vice. If such a 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 79 
 
 characterization corresponded with the reality, 
 it would be comparatively easy to carry out 
 such a system of regulation, and any moral 
 opposition which might arise could be met 
 by pointing out incidental effects that would 
 make for morality and public order. The 
 lodgings of the prostitute would be under 
 police supervision and would be prevented 
 from becoming dens of filth and contagion. 
 The police would become acquainted with the 
 general habits of such women, would know the 
 individuals who prey upon them, and thus could 
 prevent them from becoming the tools of low 
 criminals, as they so often do under conditions 
 of laissez faire. Moreover, the police would 
 naturally inquire into their antecedents and 
 would thus collect valuable data as to the 
 causes, biological and social, which are 
 responsible for such depraved forms of 
 humanity. 
 
 Even if the premise of such a class of pros- 
 titutes is accepted, the objection might be 
 raised that the semi-official position of the 
 prostitute would seem to indicate a public 
 sanction of debauch. The official guarantee 
 of good health would remove any hesitancy to 
 indulge in forbidden pleasures that fear of 
 
8o 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 disease might create. Writers of the regie- 
 mentation school claim, however, that as a 
 practical fact the patrons of women of this 
 class are not likely to be influenced much by 
 sanction or lack of sanction on the part of the 
 police, nor are they of self-control sufficient to 
 restrain their passions for fear of disease.^ 
 
 But it would be a grievous error to suppose 
 that all prostitutes, or even a very large pro- 
 portion of them, are thus easily distinguished 
 from the decent classes of society. Modern 
 prostitution is an infinitely complex phenome- 
 non. It is intangible, indefinable. From its 
 complexity arise not only the most serious 
 practical difficulties, but moral difficulties as 
 well. 
 
 With perhaps the majority of prostitutes, 
 the life of shame is only a temporary state.^ 
 In a time of distress, they resort to it as their 
 readiest means of support. Or, during certain 
 years in which their native passions are strong, 
 they accept such a life from choice, but, tiring 
 of it, they seek to return into the society which 
 they have left. At first but a comparatively 
 
 ‘ As an example of this naive type of reasoning, see Report of Par~ 
 liamentary Committee on the Contagious Diseases Acts, 1882. 
 
 ‘‘ Supra, 74. 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 8i 
 
 small number of them admit to themselves 
 that they have taken an irrevocable step. 
 They conceal their life from their friends, they 
 account in some fictitious way for their earn- 
 ings. It may be that they do not have the 
 strength to abandon the life after once be- 
 coming accustomed to it. But the majority, 
 in all probability, do abandon it. 
 
 To the average individual, it is true, there is 
 something exceedingly repulsive in the idea of 
 the restoration to decent society of women 
 who have lived a vicious life. In the small 
 city, the girl who has been the victim of the 
 selfishness and treachery of the man whom she 
 has trusted becomes a social outcast ; how 
 much more would society thrust from itself 
 those who, even under the stress of starvation, 
 have sold their honor. Yet these women are 
 members of society and can hardly be refused 
 by Government the right to reform. And re- 
 form would be all but impossible if they were 
 prevented from returning to some kind of 
 society above the plane of the common pros- 
 titute. 
 
 Now, it is clear that to the woman who, in 
 
 spite of her secret sin, still considers herself a 
 
 member of decent society, any policy that 
 6 
 
82 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 would lay bare her doings, search out her 
 antecedents, classify her with those whom she, 
 at any rate, considers infinitely beneath her, 
 would be a positive deterrent to reform. 
 Hitherto, only those knew of her shame w'ho 
 shared in it ; after she is placed under police 
 control, a whole police system is privy to it. 
 It does not matter that the Morals Service 
 is bound not to disclose what it knows ; the 
 woman is certain that at any time in her life 
 the knowledge of her previous conduct may in 
 some mysterious way leak out ; and the official 
 record of her shame exists, to be consulted by 
 favorites of the bureau, in spite of general 
 regulations. 
 
 As would be expected, it is the opponents 
 of a system of regulation who lay most stress 
 upon the fact that subjection to any police 
 control that would be sufficient for sanitar}'^ 
 purposes is a serious check to reform, — an act 
 calculated to transform the temporarj^ state of 
 prostitution into a permanent one.^ But the 
 more moderate and more rational supporters of 
 reglementation admit that inscription upon the 
 register of shame is a most serious step, and 
 
 ’ See Yves-Guyot, La Prostitution, 2x8 et seq., and Sheldon Ames, 
 Regulation of Vice, 87 et seq. 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 83 
 
 one to be taken only when the chances of 
 reform are small.^ 
 
 Such are some of the moral considerations 
 against forcing women to submit to police 
 control against their own will. In many cases, 
 however, the utmost willingness on the part of 
 the prostitute will not morally justify her regis- 
 tration. This is especially the case with 
 minors. In every large city there are num- 
 bers of very young girls engaged in profes- 
 sional vice. According to the theory of 
 sanitary regulation, these ought to be subjected 
 to periodical examinations as well as any others. 
 But moral considerations forbid the public 
 recognition of a right of children of thirteen, 
 fourteen, and fifteen to prostitute themselves. 
 It is a matter of sufficient gravity to register 
 
 ’ “ Inscription upon the register of the bureau of morals is the 
 final stage of vice, the final term of degradation. It is the official 
 formality, which, like the licentia stupri of the Romans, regulates 
 and legitimates the sad trade of prostitution. It is, in a word, that 
 sinister act which severs a woman from society and which makes 
 her a chattel of the Administration.” — Mireur, La Prostitution a 
 Marseilles. 
 
 “ The system of supervision and regulation of vice which exists 
 almost everywhere to-day is more designed to force into the depths 
 the girls who are upon the downward path, and to retain in the pro- 
 fession of prostitution those who are already under police control, 
 than to lighten their return to the right.” — Neisser, Conference In- 
 ternationale, Brussels, iSgg ; Rapports Preliminaires, ^me Question, 
 14; alsojeannel, o‘p. eit., 315. 
 
84 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 minors of more years than these. On the 
 Continent, the consent of parents and guardians 
 is usually required for their registration. It 
 is difficult to see how the securing of the 
 consent of a probably vicious and worthless 
 parent can relieve the administration of any 
 moral responsibility. 
 
 It would, accordingly, seem that while there 
 is a class of prostitutes who would hardly be 
 injured by sanitary regulation, whom it might 
 be for the public welfare to subject to such 
 regulation, there is also a class the subjection 
 of which to regulation is inadmissible from 
 the moral point of view. In practice, every" 
 system of regulation is compelled to take a 
 middle course, sacrificing moral ends to sani- 
 tary and sanitary to moral. As a result, it is 
 impossible to realize either end completely. 
 
 There are other moral difficulties in the way 
 of a system of regulation. No amount of 
 sophistical discrimination between the words 
 “ toleration ” and “ recognition ” can conceal 
 the fact that a system of regulation makes of 
 prostitution a legitimate industry^ subject to 
 regulations in the behalf of its patrons identi- 
 cal in nature with the early regulations as to 
 the weight of the loaf of bread, or the size and 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 85 
 
 quality of the yard of woollens. Almost every- 
 one is familiar enough with human nature to 
 know that the notion that any indulgence is a 
 general need, inherent in the state of manhood, 
 creates in the growing boy an almost irresistible 
 impulse to experience it. State recognition 
 and regulation of prostitution would unques- 
 tionably tend to confirm the already common 
 opinion that secret indulgence is an imperative 
 need. 
 
 Again, the creation of the impression that 
 prostitution is safe is pretty sure to increase 
 the patronage of the prostitute, and in so far 
 to increase the material basis without which 
 prostitution would perish. While there are 
 large numbers of men who cannot be deterred 
 from incontinence by fear of disease, yet even 
 of these there are doubtless some who indulge 
 less freely in vicious pleasures for that reason. 
 It is a notorious fact that travellers are less 
 self-restrained in this respect in cities that have 
 the reputation of possessing a good system of 
 regulation than they are elsewhere.^ 
 
 ' It is sometimes argued that the fact that the “ control-book” is 
 very rarely shown by the prostitute to her patrons proves that little 
 thought is given to the possibility of disease, and that hence the 
 guarantee of good health does not add to the sum-total of immor- 
 ality. Of course it proves nothing of the kind. In a city where 
 
86 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 In the practical working of regulation sys- 
 tems, there are many features that are not 
 in keeping with moral requirements. The 
 French system of encouraging the establish- 
 ment of brothels is a case in point. Anyone 
 knows that the assembling under one roof of 
 a group of depraved women means a still 
 further increase in their depravity. The crea- 
 tion of a propertied class which legitimately 
 shares the profits of vice is in itself demoraliz- 
 ing. It means the recognition of pecuniary 
 interests in the fall of women. ^ In no country 
 have brothels existed without the rise of indi- 
 viduals who make seduction a profession. Of 
 course, flagrant crimes against morality are 
 sometimes punished. Nevertheless, if the 
 brothel is to exist, it cannot be held too 
 
 sanitary regulation exists, the patron generally takes it for granted 
 that such women are subjected to it and that the fact that they are 
 at large proves their freedom from disease. (For authority as to the 
 popular belief in the safety of regulated prostitution, see Strdhmberg, 
 Die Prostitution, I20.) 
 
 ' France has long possessed a regular publication {Annuaire 
 Reirum) which gives the addresses of all houses of prostitution in 
 the cities and towns of France, together with information of in- 
 terest to the “ trade,” such as the towns suited by population and 
 number of men in the garrison for the establishment of new broth- 
 els, etc. The procuring of new recruits for the brothels is often 
 undertaken by men representing groups of licensed houses. — Reuss, 
 op. cit,, isi et seg. 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 87 
 
 strictly to account for the measures it takes in 
 securing the necessary number of occupants. 
 
 It has long been recognized that it is evil, 
 from the moral point of view, to permit the 
 sale of alcoholic liquors in brothels. The ex- 
 istence of places of amusement in connection 
 with brothels is another serious evil ; men 
 who are simply in search of amusement that 
 is harmless in itself are likely to be attracted 
 there, only to become subject to temptations 
 which they do not have the strength to resist. 
 Accordingly, it was at first the policy in Paris 
 to prohibit music and dancing, and the sale 
 of intoxicants in public brothels. But it was 
 found that the brothel could not exist under 
 such conditions. And so the Parisian broth- 
 els have been permitted to transform them- 
 selves into luxurious cafes and the like, where 
 every form of harmless entertainment is en- 
 listed in the service of vice. 
 
 Again, public morals demand that solicita- 
 tion upon the street and in public places^ 
 
 ’ “ From the moment that by inscription a semi-official seal is 
 placed upon prostitution, one is morally bound to grant the women 
 upon whom obligations are imposed the right to exercise their trade. 
 For the great majority of public women, solicitation upon the street 
 is the only kind that can be employed. The street, where they 
 elbow the passers-by, furnishes them the means of their existence ; 
 forbid it them, and they die of hunger.” — Reuss, op. cit., 265. 
 
88 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 should cease. But the prostitute at large 
 would find it practically impossible to live if 
 the prohibition were enforced. The enforce- 
 ment of such a regulation is not in harmony 
 with a system of toleration. 
 
 The licensed prostitute is perfectly aware of 
 this fact, and her conduct is apt to be marked 
 by a flagrancy which the clandestine prostitute 
 would not dare to assume. 
 
 Of course it is perfectly apparent that a 
 system of regulation which includes sanitary 
 supervision may, from a moral point of view, 
 be far better than a system of absolute laissez 
 faire. Where prostitution is absolutely unre- 
 strained, as it was in London some years ago, 
 crimes against morality are without doubt more 
 frequent than in a city like Paris. The de- 
 bauching of minors was infinitely more fre- 
 quent ; the forcible detention in brothels, a 
 thing not unknown in Paris, was fairly com- 
 mon. Ororanized societies for the debauchino^ 
 
 o o 
 
 of little girls have existed, and probably still 
 exist.^ Solicitation is nowhere more open, 
 more cynical. 
 
 But comparison cannot be made between a 
 
 * See Revelations of the Pall Mall Gazette, 1886 ; also Select Re- 
 port on Law relating to the Protection of Young Girls, r88i, 579. 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 89 
 
 city in which there is practically no police 
 control of vice, and one in which a most effi- 
 cient police system has struggled with the evil 
 for a century. Moreover, the conditions of 
 the two cities are not such as to permit of a 
 comparison of any value at all. One must 
 rather compare the moral condition of a city 
 in which sanitary control exists with the con- 
 ditions that would prevail were sanitary con- 
 trol replaced by an equally efficient moral 
 control. 
 
 There is one important consideration which 
 may be noticed here, although it concerns itself 
 immediately with public policy rather than 
 with morality proper. Every student of polit- 
 ical science knows that it is a serious matter to 
 create laws or regulations which do not express 
 the moral feelings of the more law-abiding 
 class of society. The legal institution of mala 
 prohibita which are not generally felt to be 
 mala in se necessarily tends to diminish the 
 feeling for the sanctity of the law, — a feeling 
 without which laws can be effectively adminis- 
 tered only by the strong hand of despotic 
 government. 
 
 Infinitely more grave is the institution of 
 laws which are, rightly or wrongly, felt by the 
 
90 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 moral classes of a State to be of execrable im- 
 morality. If, for example, it were agreed by 
 sociological and political theorists that social 
 welfare would be furthered by the literal en- 
 slavement of the idle and vicious, a law to that 
 effect would be a menace to good government 
 so long as the general public looks upon human 
 liberty as sacred. It is conceivable that ab- 
 stract thinkers might conclude that society 
 would be better off if the congenitally defect- 
 ive, those of criminal instincts, and those who 
 suffer from incurable, loathsome and danger- 
 ous diseases could be put out of the way. But 
 no sane legislator Avould be willing to violate 
 the feeling of the sanctity of human life. 
 
 In every civilized country there is a large 
 class of persons who look upon reglementation 
 as a State iniquity exactly analogous to the 
 above hypothetical policies. They consider 
 that by legitimizing vice the State identifies it- 
 self with immorality. By creating a class of 
 administrative chattels for the use and enjoy- 
 ment of the vicious, the State outrages the 
 deepest sentiments of humanity. By discrimi- 
 nating between vicious women and vicious 
 men, it insults womankind. By rendering vice 
 innocuous, either in fact or in seeming, it in- 
 
Moral and Sanitary Control 91 
 
 cites the youth of both sexes to debauch. The 
 defender of sanitary regulation will argue in 
 vain against reasoning of this kind. He may 
 try to prove that the countervailing good of 
 reglementation would be so great that the sum 
 of human happiness would be greatly increased 
 by its introduction. But moral sentiments do 
 not demand that society should be happy ; 
 they do demand that it should be moral. 
 
 Accordingly, even if it could be shown that 
 sanitary regulation is actually as effective in 
 checking disease as its supporters claim, and 
 even if it were impossible to demonstrate a se- 
 rious moral cost, the legislator would be com- 
 pelled to take into account the existence of 
 such general antagonism to the policy of reg- 
 lementation. There is every reason for believ- 
 ing that, in an American city, the more moral 
 element in the population would be practically 
 a unit against it. 
 
 One further objection, also political rather 
 than moral, may be added. It is the general 
 belief of political thinkers, at least in Anglo- 
 Saxon states, that every encroachment upon 
 the liberty of the individual is an evil in itself, 
 only to be justified by a very great good re- 
 sulting from it. A system which makes it 
 
92 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 possible for the police to seize on suspicion any 
 citizen and impose upon him an insulting ex- 
 amination for the purpose of discovering dis- 
 ease, and to imprison him on suspicion that he 
 would immorally communicate it if left at large, 
 cannot be said to be in harmony with the prin- 
 ciples of personal liberty. Any person might 
 be subject to such indignity, since the natural 
 grounds upon which the administrators of such 
 a system would act are the accusations of 
 persons who have confessedly shared in im- 
 morality.^ 
 
 It need not be supposed that the liberty of 
 the average citizen is secured because the po- 
 lice in this specific case act only with regard 
 to friendless women. One inroad into the 
 domain of individual liberty is a precedent 
 for another. 
 
 ■ In Paris and Berlin the registered prostitutes are recognized 
 auxiliaries of the police in hunting down clandestine prostitutes. It 
 can readily be seen that the personal liberty of any woman who is 
 not of unquestioned standing in society may be jeopardized by the 
 spite of a common harlot. 
 
CHAPTEP. VIII 
 
 PRACTICAL DIFFICULTIES IN THE REGULATION OF 
 PROSTITUTION 
 
 We have seen that the ideal of sanitary 
 regulation can, for moral reasons, admit of 
 only an approximate realization. It is of great 
 importance to examine regulation as it exists 
 to-day, with a view to ascertaining how far 
 the approximation falls short of the ideal. 
 
 That part of prostitution which cannot be 
 subjected to sanitary control is necessarily 
 very large. Probably far the greater number 
 of prostitutes begin their career of shame be- 
 fore they have attained their majority.^ 
 
 This fact is so well known that authority 
 need hardly be cited to prove it. It stands to 
 reason that the waif or neglected child of 
 fifteen, sixteen or seventeen should fall the 
 
 ’ Of looo prostitutes concerning whom Dr. Le Pileur was able to 
 secure detailed information, 758 began to prostitute themselves be- 
 fore the twenty-first year ; 109 were prostitutes before the sixteenth 
 year. — Le Pileur, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899; Rap- 
 ports Preiiminaires, jme Question, 47. 
 
 93 
 
94 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 easiest prey, first of the seducer and later of 
 the procurer. 
 
 Since the average length of time in which 
 a prostitute exercises her trade is not more 
 than half a dozen years, it is evident that the 
 minors make up a considerable proportion of 
 the total numbers of those who are at any 
 time engaged in prostitution. 
 
 But minors, as a rule, cannot be subjected 
 to sanitary control. In every country there is 
 a strong public sentiment against the official 
 recognition of minor prostitutes. Whether it 
 is a sound moral sentiment or mere sentimen- 
 tality, it must be counted with as a fact ; and 
 no administration dares to violate it to any 
 great extent.^ 
 
 With the minors may be grouped the very 
 large numbers of prostitutes who will not vol- 
 untarily subject themselves to sanitary control, 
 and whose conduct is not sufficiently notorious 
 to justify compulsory registration. Naturally, 
 most prostitutes begin in this class. They are 
 
 ’ In Berlin, 229 minors were registered in i8g8. Anyone can see 
 that the number is wholly insignificant as compared with the number 
 actually living in the state of prostitution. In Paris, from 1816 to 
 1832, 59 of those newly registered were minors. From 1851 to 
 1866 minors made up 33 %. From 1880 to r886 the minors were 
 20 %. The percentage has declined since, but the exact figures are 
 not at hand. 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 95 
 
 not at first sufficiently hardened to be willing 
 to be classed with notorious prostitutes ; they 
 still cherish the purpose of returning to hon- 
 orable life. And although the police may sus- 
 pect them, in probably nine cases out of ten it 
 would be impossible to obtain proof that would 
 by any regular course of judicial procedure 
 convict them of debauch. It is true that such 
 proof is not absolutely necessary. Every 
 police administration that undertakes to con- 
 trol prostitution pursues a more or less ar- 
 bitrary policy. But experience has proved 
 that such a policy must be pursued with great 
 care. Otherwise the charge is sure to arise 
 that honorable women have been seized and 
 branded with the deepest infamy known to 
 civilization. It may be that the women in 
 question are really what the police consider 
 them to be. But if positive proof is wanting, 
 as must generally be the case, the women 
 stand innocent before the general public. And 
 many such charges would annihilate any police 
 organization. 
 
 Continental defenders of sanitary regulation 
 frequently deplore the violent opposition to 
 the sanitary police that is aroused whenever 
 the charge of arbitrary procedure is made. 
 
96 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 The system of sanitary control, they claim, 
 is shorn of all effectiveness if the police are 
 not empowered to act upon reasonable sus- 
 picion. Whether the popular feeling is sound 
 or not, it is not necessary to inquire. The 
 fact remains that it exists in every country, 
 and that administrative systems find them- 
 selves compelled to respect it. Even in 
 Russia, where, we are accustomed to believe, 
 the police do much as they please, the high- 
 class prostitute is seldom forced upon the 
 register, for the simple reason that she can 
 make her cause heard. ^ It Is the low-class 
 woman who is the subject of arbitrary disposal. 
 In Germany, imbued as it is with military 
 ideals, the police proceed with a good deal of 
 freedom in registering women against their 
 will. Lack of visible means of support, and 
 the existence of venereal disease are taken as 
 proof of prostitution. Of course, reflection 
 will show that such proof is not absolute. But 
 the public is generally willing enough to be- 
 lieve that a woman without support, especially 
 if diseased, is of bad character ; and doubtless 
 mistakes would not be so very frequent. The 
 experience of Berlin proves, however, that the 
 
 * Sturmer,Z)2V Prostitution in Rttssland, 107. 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 97 
 
 great majority of those who are actually pros- 
 titutes cannot be discovered even in this way. 
 
 In Paris, the police are more circumspect in 
 proceeding to register unwilling women as 
 prostitutes. The movement for the abolition 
 of control during the ’seventies and ’eighties 
 brought to light some exceedingly unfortunate 
 mistakes that had been made in the arrest of 
 suspected women.^ Doubtless the Bureau of 
 Morals proceeded with as great caution as 
 possible. But if compulsory registration is 
 employed freely, some mistakes are inevitable. 
 
 It would be interesting to know how far 
 such a policy could be pursued in a great city 
 of England or America, with Anglo-Saxon 
 notions of personal liberty and of inviolability 
 of domicile, and with Anglo-Saxon dislike for 
 police inquisition into private affairs. Of 
 course a great number of low-class prostitutes 
 could be picked up in notorious resorts, and 
 public opinion might find little to object 
 to. But as soon as the more notorious had 
 been disposed of, it is difificult to see how the 
 police could proceed farther. 
 
 Accordingly, it may be taken for granted 
 
 •Mrs. Butler, Personal Reminiscences of a Great Crusade, 285; 
 Yves-Guyot, op. cit., 126. 
 
98 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 that voluntary registration must chiefly be 
 relied upon. Such is the case in the two cities 
 we have selected as typical.' It may, further, 
 be taken for granted that the very great ma- 
 jority of prostitutes will never submit volun- 
 tarily.^ 
 
 Without laying too great weight upon con- 
 jectural estimates (although the authors cited 
 are entitled to the highest respect), one may 
 consider it a very conservative opinion that in 
 
 * Of course, “ voluntary ” inscription must be understood to imply 
 something quite different from free consent. By frequent arrests, by 
 threats of long imprisonment, and the like, these women are com- 
 pelled to submit. But of course no such persecution would compel 
 a really innocent woman to consent to inscription. 
 
 ^ Every authority on prostitution will state that the unsubjected 
 or “ clandestine ” prostitutes far outnumber those who are subject to 
 control. Naturally, the number of the clandestine can be arrived at 
 only by conjecture. Some of these conjectures may, however, be 
 worth mentioning. 
 
 Barthelemy estimates that the clandestine prostitutes are from ten 
 to fifteen times as numerous as the subjected. Reuss contents him- 
 self with saying that the clandestine are greatly in the majority. 
 Lecour, writing in the ’seventies, estimated the number of prosti- 
 tutes in Paris at 30,ocxD, of whom about 4000 were subjected. At 
 present, something over 6000 are subjected ; and from the incessant 
 complaints of the increase of clandestine prostitution, we may infer 
 that the proportion has not changed for the better (from the regle- 
 mentist point of view). Muller, writing in 1867, estimated the pros- 
 titutes of Vienna at 20 , 000 . In all probability the number has since 
 doubled. Those under sanitary control numbered 2400 in 1896. 
 Nieman, in 1890, estimated that there were 50,000 prostitutes in 
 Berlin ; in 1887, 3063 were under sanitary control. 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 99 
 
 none of the great cities of Europe do the 
 registered prostitutes make up more than from 
 ten to twenty-five per cent, of the total num- 
 ber of those who gain their living by pros- 
 titution. 
 
 Without reflection, one would be inclined to 
 suppose that the part controlled is the more 
 dangerous from the sanitary point of view, 
 since the more notoriously debauched. So far 
 as syphilis is concerned, this is a mistake. It 
 must be remembered that the syphilitic, after 
 two or three years, does not normally transmit 
 contagion, and that she is immune against 
 fresh infection. 
 
 f Syphilitic disease is so common among the 
 ' patrons of prostitution that a prostitute rarely 
 escapes the disease for more than two or three 
 years after entering upon her life of shame.^ 
 It is, however, these years in which the prosti- 
 tute is most averse to submission to control, 
 \and in which it is the most difficult for the 
 police to force her to accept control. 
 
 Accordingly, it lies in the nature of the case 
 
 ’ Out of the 718 syphilitic prostitutes observed by Le Pileur, 489, 
 or 68 were contaminated in the same year in which they began 
 to be prostitutes ; loi, or is %, in the year following. — Le Pileur, 
 Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Rapports Preluninaires, 
 ^me Question, 49. 
 
lOO 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 that a very large percentage of those who sub- 
 mit to registration have gone through with 
 their contagious period either partially or 
 wholly/ This would be especially true in 
 the case of those infected while minors, 
 since even just ground for suspicion is not 
 sufficient to permit of their registration. It 
 will surprise no one to know that a very large 
 proportion of all prostitutes are infected before 
 their majority.^ 
 
 When we take these facts into account, it 
 seems probable that of those who become regis- 
 tered prostitutes, the dangerous period does 
 not, on the average, bear as great a proportion 
 
 ' Of 431 registered prostitutes observed by the same authority, 318, 
 or 74 %, were already syphilitic when registered; 147, or 34 had been 
 infected a year or more before they were registered. — Le Pileur, 
 Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Rapports Preliniinaires, 
 pine Question, 60. 
 
 Dr. Le Pileur describes the early career of the typical prostitute 
 in the following “ aphorism ” : 
 
 “ Deflowered at 16, 
 
 Prostitute at 17, 
 
 Syphilitic at 18.” 
 
 Out of the 718 syphilitic prostitutes, 498, or 69^, were infected 
 before the twenty-first year. — Le Pileur, Hid. 
 
 According to Fournier fls, 63 ^ of syphilitic prostitutes under 
 his observation had been infected before the twenty-first year. — Con- 
 ference Internationale, Brussels, 1899; Compte Rendu, ii., ire 
 Question, 82. 
 
 Jullien finds that 65 % are contam'.nated before twenty-one. — Con- 
 ference Internationale ; Compte Rendu, ii., ire Question, 58. 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation loi 
 
 to the post-contagious period of their career as 
 registered prostitutes as did the contagious 
 period before registration to the period before 
 infection. Moreover, those who are never 
 registered at all do not continue in their life 
 of dishonor as long after becoming immune 
 as do those who are eventually registered. 
 
 One further fact to be taken into account is 
 that the patron, or rather the consumer, of the 
 child-prostitute does not exercise the same 
 caution that he would under other circum- 
 stances. He flatters himself that it is the first 
 debauch or pretty nearly the first. In like 
 manner, the man who has illicit relations with 
 women who outwardly seem entirely respect- 
 able is unlikely to suspect disease. 
 
 Accordingly, there would seem to be a good 
 a priori reason for believing that the clandes- 
 tine prostitutes are far more dangerous than 
 the registered ; and this quite without regard 
 for the greater or less degree of perfection of 
 sanitary surveillance. 
 
 The comparative morbidity of the clandes- 
 tine and the registered prostitutes has been very 
 much discussed. As a rule, all supporters of 
 regulation are agreed that the clandestine 
 prostitute is far more likely to be diseased than 
 
102 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 the registered prostitute. The opponents of 
 regulation hold the opposite view. The for- 
 mer party seem to have the better facts to 
 support their contention. 
 
 One way of proving the dangerous character 
 of clandestine prostitution is to make inquiries 
 as to the source of contagion of men afflicted 
 with venereal disease. But little information 
 of value can be obtained in this way, since 
 the patient is often uncertain as to which one 
 of a number of prostitutes may have infected 
 him. Again, if he knows it, he may refuse to 
 designate the person, since that would render 
 her liable to arrest. Moreover, since the 
 clandestine are held to be not quite so low as 
 the registered prostitutes, many men will give 
 false information out of a species of pride. 
 
 But even if it could be certainly known how 
 great the number infected by each class, no 
 really valid comparison could be made, because 
 no one knows the exact number of clandestine 
 prostitutes. 
 
 A second way is to compare the state of 
 health of the clandestine prostitutes who are 
 arrested and examined with that of the regis- 
 tered prostitutes. This, too, can give no cer- 
 tain information, since those who are arrested 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 103 
 
 are but a fraction of the total number, and 
 may not be fairly representative of it at all. 
 Such as it is, however, it is the only empirical 
 evidence of any value that is attainable. This 
 seems to be decidedly against the clandestine. 
 From 1872 to 1888, the sanitary service of 
 Paris examined 45,577 registered prostitutes 
 and 47,340 clandestine. The average morbid- 
 ity of the clandestine was 31.65 ^ ; that of the 
 registered 13.47^.^ 
 
 No separation of the various diseases is here 
 made. It is generally claimed that the com- 
 parative proportion of syphilis alone is much 
 more favorable to the registered. This is 
 what one would expect, since gonorrhoea does 
 not carry immunity with it, as does syphilis, 
 and hence may be as common among the 
 older prostitutes as among the younger. 
 
 Older authorities on prostitution try to es- 
 tablish the comparative morbidity from the 
 number of examinations in which disease is 
 discovered. This is, of course, a wholly absurd 
 procedure. The registered prostitute who is 
 diseased is removed to the hospital and ceases 
 to figure in the statistics of examinations until 
 
 * Augagneur, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899; Rap- 
 forts Prlliminaires, i., 65 et seq. 
 
104 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 she is cured, when she again helps to swell the 
 number of examinations in which no disease is 
 found. Whenever figures are cited showing 
 that the clandestine are ten or twenty or fifty 
 times as dangerous as the registered, one may 
 be certain that this astonishing fallacy is 
 <"hiefly responsible for them. 
 
 From such facts as we have, we may, how- 
 ever, conclude that the more dangerous prosti- 
 tutes, from the sanitary point of view, are those 
 who cannot be subjected to sanitary control. 
 
 It remains to consider how far that fraction 
 of prostitution which can actually be brought 
 under sanitary control is really rendered in- 
 nocuous. This is, of course, a question for 
 medical specialists to discuss rather than for 
 laymen. Nevertheless, it is of the utmost im- 
 portance for the layman to know what conclu- 
 sions the specialists have reached. 
 
 It may be remarked, in passing, that the dis- 
 cussion of this question has taken an altogether 
 new turn in late years. Twenty years ago it 
 was only the moralist, who knew nothing of 
 medicine, who dared to connect venereal dis- 
 ease with registered prostitution. It is diffi- 
 cult to find a single competent writer of the 
 present day who does not deplore the imper- 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 105 
 
 fections of the system as it exists, and who 
 does not admit that registered prostitutes are 
 responsible for a vast amount of venereal 
 infection. 
 
 In the first place, it is universally agreed 
 that the manner of inspection is imperfect. In 
 many places the inspection has to take place 
 under circumstances that preclude the possi- 
 bility of scientific accuracy. The apparatus 
 needed is often wanting ; the physicians ap- 
 pointed for the work are far too much over- 
 worked, and they are not men who have been 
 specially trained for it. Consequently, many 
 of the prostitutes who are dismissed with the 
 official stamp of good health are capable of 
 transmitting contagion. Cases are frequent 
 where men who have accompanied them from 
 the dispensary have been infected with venereal 
 disease.^ 
 
 These deficiencies, it would seem, are almost 
 entirely due to lack of necessary funds. This 
 is clearly the case with the imperfection of 
 
 ' According to Carlier, there are frequently groups of cautious in- 
 dividuals prowling about the doors of the dispensary, waiting to 
 accompany those who have been found by the physician to be in 
 good health. It is hard to characterize the immorality of a system 
 that wantonly deludes men of such exemplary prudence ! What 
 wonder that the doctors are sometimes threatened with assassination ? 
 
io6 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 apparatus. The same reason explains the 
 needless haste with which examinations are 
 made. By methods known to modern science, 
 gonorrhoea is practically always capable of 
 being established.^ The diagnosis of syphilis 
 has never been especially difficult. 
 
 But the expense that the needed changes 
 would involve would be considerable. Strohm- 
 berg thinks that one physician could manage 
 four hundred prostitutes. Finger would place 
 fifty only under each physician. Other authori- 
 ties are inclined to require fewer physicians 
 than Finger, but more than Strohmberg. 
 
 If we suppose that each physician could 
 adequately examine and treat one hundred 
 prostitutes, it is plain that the cost would not 
 be light. In Paris, with six thousand regis- 
 tered prostitutes, sixty physicians would be 
 needed instead of twenty-four. It is true that 
 at Paris the salaries of professional men are 
 ridiculously low, so that the charge would not 
 weigh very heavily upon the budget. But if 
 New York were to adopt a system of regie- 
 mentation, controlling four or five thousand 
 
 ’ Kromayer and a number of other authorities deny this. — Con- 
 ference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Communications, i. ; Appen- 
 dix, 26. 
 
ct 
 
 Practical Difficulties in Regulation 107 
 
 prostitutes (and few would advocate a system 
 which should control less), the expense would 
 be a matter of no small importance. The ser- 
 vices of forty or fifty specialists could not be 
 secured at a trifling cost. 
 
 To be sure, this point would not have much 
 importance in the case of some other branch 
 of sanitary service. But it must always be 
 borne in mind that the great body of taxpayers 
 would bear with very ill grace an expense 
 created by other men’s profligacy. 
 
 It is frequently suggested that by a system 
 of charges for examination, a sanitary bureau 
 may be made self-supporting.^ Against the 
 plan is the unanswerable argument of one 
 hundred years of experience. Every city 
 which has adopted sanitary control at first 
 attempted to meet expenses in this way ; and 
 every large city has found that the plan works 
 execrably. The most difficult part of a sys- 
 tem of control is to induce prostitutes to 
 submit to it voluntarily ; and every burden 
 imposed upon them will deter them from 
 doing so. Accordingly, it has been suggested 
 that those who do submit should receive a 
 
 * This view is advanced by Dr. F. R. Sturgis, in Medicitu^ June, 
 1901. 
 
io8 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 pension ; nor is the suggestion unworthy of 
 consideration, if sanitary control is to be 
 adopted. It is time for everyone to disil- 
 lusion himself of the idea that the expenses 
 of a system of regulation can be met from 
 any other source than general taxation. 
 
 The second charge is that examinations do 
 not take place at sufficiently frequent inter- 
 vals. In Paris, excepting for the relatively 
 small number of inmates of licensed houses, 
 examinations are theoretically made every two 
 weeks. As a fact, many delay their visit to 
 the dispensary, so that the average time is 
 longer. In Berlin, according to regulations, 
 examinations are made weekly. In practice, 
 the average number of examinations per an- 
 num is twenty-six.^ In St. Petersburg, in 
 1893, the average number for prostitutes at 
 large was twenty-seven ; in Moscow, in the 
 same year, it was only four.^ 
 
 Of course, whatever good regulation may 
 do must be greatly diminished when examina- 
 tions are so infrequent. Disease may reach the 
 contagious form soon after inspection and 
 may be freely transmitted for two weeks or 
 
 ' Blaschko, Conference Internatio/iale, Brussels, 1899 ; Enquetes, 
 i., 671. * StUrmer, op. cit., 121. 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 109 
 
 longer. The reasons why such a state of 
 affairs exists are chiefly administrative. The 
 examination is exceedingly irksome to the 
 prostitute ; and if it be made very frequent, 
 she will do her best to evade control alto- 
 gether. Were not this difficulty real, we may 
 be certain that semi-weekly examinations 
 would long ago have been instituted in all 
 Continental cities. 
 
 The difficulty is much less in the case of 
 the inmates of licensed houses. They cannot 
 escape the examiner. This is one of the main 
 reasons why the licensed house is so much 
 favored by the police, in spite of its moral 
 defects. But the spirit of the times makes 
 it impossible to confine any large part of the 
 prostitutes in licensed houses. 
 
 Here, then, we have a difficulty which 
 seems to be insurmountable. After a hundred 
 years of experience, and with practically un- 
 limited power to deal with prostitution as it will, 
 the most perfect of police administrations, that 
 of Paris, is manifestly unable to cope with it. 
 
 Under this head there is one further sub- 
 traction to be made from the efficacy of regu- 
 lation. The prostitute who discovers herself 
 infected is naturally in no haste to go to the 
 
I lO 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 dispensary, knowing, as she does, that weeks, 
 perhaps months, of confinement will follow. 
 Instead, she lingers as long as possible, or 
 even disappears from her accustomed haunts 
 and plies her vocation as a clandestine pros- 
 titute. She may be retaken by the police, 
 and is subject to imprisonment after her re- 
 covery. But the future penalty does not out- 
 weigh the present prospect of being sent to 
 the hospital.^ 
 
 ' Of 391 licensed prostitutes at large who were infected with 
 syphilis, 74 per cent, were sent to the hospital in consequence of 
 arrests made by the police. Of course, they would not have gone 
 at once had they not been arrested. — Le Pileur, Conf^re 7 ice Inter- 
 nationale^ Brussels, 1899; Rapports PrRiminaires, jme Question, 71. 
 
 It may be of interest here to note the number of prostitutes w^ho 
 attempt to escape from control, and the number retaken by the 
 police. 
 
 
 Total number 
 registered. 
 
 Disappeared. 
 
 Restored to 
 controL 
 
 1888 
 
 4591 
 
 1779 
 
 1491 
 
 1889 
 
 4951 
 
 2125 
 
 1309 
 
 1890 
 
 4770 
 
 1555 
 
 1234 
 
 1891 
 
 5015 
 
 1450 
 
 821 
 
 1892 
 
 5004 
 
 1436 
 
 869 
 
 1893 
 
 4793 
 
 II 2 I 
 
 739 
 
 1894 
 
 5154 
 
 794 
 
 616 
 
 1895 
 
 5790 
 
 1456 
 
 494 
 
 1896 
 
 5900 
 
 1190 
 
 615 
 
 1897 
 
 5233 
 
 1599 
 
 454 
 
 1898 
 
 6018 
 
 344 
 
 498 
 
 — Louis Fiaux, Conference Intersiationale, Brzessels, 1899; Rapports 
 Prlliminaires , 2me Question, 12 1. 
 
 5609 prostitutes thus “ disappeared ” definitely in the eleven 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 
 
 1 1 1 
 
 In the second place, it is generally admitted 
 that the treatment is not sufficiently prolonged 
 to cure the maladies discovered ; that as a 
 rtde, in case of syphilis, the prostitute is dis- 
 missed from the hospital while quite capable 
 of transmitting the disease. The external 
 appearance of the disease is made to vanish ; 
 the disease remains. As a French writer has 
 put it, the prostitutes are whitewashed, not 
 cured. This is pretty largely the case with 
 gonorrhoea also. For the first two or three 
 years, the syphilitic may at any time trans- 
 mit disease ; gonorrhoea, if not completely 
 cured, may be transmitted for an indefinite 
 period. To cure the latter malady com- 
 pletely, several months of treatment may be 
 required ; it is still a disputed point whether 
 or not there is not a large proportion of 
 women infected with it who can never be 
 cured at all.^ 
 
 years. Of course many reasons besides desire to escape the hos- 
 pital must have operated ; but no one can doubt that many dis- 
 appeared in order to prostitute themselves clandestinely either in 
 Paris or in other cities, carrying disease with them. 
 
 ’ Kromayer makes this contention. Jadassohn, on the other hand, 
 claims that in most cases it may be cured if time enough be given. 
 But he frankly states that it is merely an opinion, and admits that 
 it is not as yet proven . — Conference Internationale, Brussels, l8gg; 
 Rapports Preliminaires, 27 ne Question, 41, 
 
I 12 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 The question arises whether this can be 
 remedied. From a practical point of view, 
 it is hard to see how it can. It is out of the 
 question to detain all the prostitutes with 
 latent syphilis in the hospital until the two- 
 or three-year period of contagion is over, 
 Tarnowsky, Jadassohn, Finger, and a host 
 of other medical men suggest the erection 
 of asylums where they may be confined, 
 and where the women afflicted with excep- 
 tionally stubborn cases of gonorrhoea may be 
 kept. 
 
 According to Finger, about 25^ of all li- 
 censed prostitutes are in the highly contagious 
 stage of latent syphilis. From this we may 
 form an estimate as to the practicability of 
 the asylum scheme. In our hypothetical sys- 
 tem of regulation in New York, we should 
 constantly have from 1000 to 1500 persons 
 serving two- and three-year terms in a species 
 of health reformatory. We should also have 
 a considerable number under indeterminate 
 sentence for gonorrhoea, — a sentence which 
 would in some cases expire only when old age 
 should render the woman innocuous. The 
 question of the costs at once looms up. But, 
 quite apart from that, the plan is absurd, for 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 113 
 
 no prostitute would submit to an examination 
 that might lead to such consequences, if she 
 could by any possible means escape it. Vol- 
 untary inscription would be unthinkable, and 
 the difficulties of official inscription would be 
 immeasurably increased. 
 
 There is a minor factor that may be taken 
 into account before we leave the question of 
 the safety of regulated prostitution. The 
 question has often been raised, — generally by 
 laymen, it is true, — whether contagion is not 
 frequently mediate. When it is remembered 
 how frequently a low-class prostitute performs 
 the same office, it would seem reasonable that 
 some of her patrons may receive the virus of 
 disease indirectly from others. This has been 
 adduced to explain the alleged fact that cases 
 of disease traceable to inmates of licensed 
 houses are likely to be more frequent, propor- 
 tionately, than those originating with the 
 isolated but registered prostitutes, in spite of 
 the fact that the former may show a smaller 
 percentage of disease. 
 
 It may be seen, then, that many subtrac- 
 tions from the ideal of sanitary control must 
 be made before we reach the actual effi- 
 ciency of existing and practicable regulation. 
 
 8 
 
The Social Evil 
 
 114 
 
 If, as seems reasonable, a system of regula- 
 tion encourages indulgence to a certain ex- 
 tent, it will be necessary to make a further 
 subtraction. 
 
 If, however, the small sanitary good that is 
 due to reglementation were a permanent ac- 
 quisition of society, much might be said for 
 the system. If venereal disease might in this 
 manner be diminished, little by little, through 
 the generations, it might be seriously con- 
 sidered whether the grave present costs ought 
 not to be assumed. As a fact, so long as 
 diseased patrons of prostitution are permitted 
 to transmit their maladies without restraint, 
 practically no permanent improvement is to 
 be expected. A brief relaxation of sanitary 
 control would restore exactly the conditions 
 prevailing before its institution, provided the 
 moral habits of the community remained un- 
 changed. In undertaking one-sided regula- 
 tion, society takes upon itself a burden which 
 it can never lay down without losing ev’^ery 
 advantage gained by its assumption. 
 
 This fact has led to the demand that all 
 visitors of prostitutes should be subjected to 
 sanitary inspection. The scheme is obviously 
 impracticable, since such inspection could take 
 
Practical Difficulties in Regulation 115 
 
 place only in the brothel. If physical exami- 
 nation were required of visitors of licensed 
 brothels, the licensed brothel would disappear 
 for want of patronage, and isolated and clan- 
 destine prostitution would take its place. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE ACTUAL EFFECTIVENESS OF SANITARY 
 CONTROL 
 
 Since the system of sanitary control of 
 prostitution has been tried in many parts of 
 Europe, and since it has in some cities been 
 consistently applied for over a centur}', one 
 would naturally expect to find statistical proof of 
 its effectiveness in preventing venereal disease. 
 
 In attempting to establish the usefulness of 
 sanitary control, comparisons of morbidity 
 have been made between cities subject to reg- 
 ulation and cities in which regulation does not 
 exist ; secondly, comparisons of morbidity be- 
 fore and after the introduction or abolition of 
 regulation have been made ; and thirdly, a 
 study has been made of the comparative fre- 
 quency of disease in cities and countries where 
 severity of control has varied.^ 
 
 The third method is, of course, the most 
 
 ’ Blaschko, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899; Rapports 
 Priliminaires, ire Question, 76. 
 
 116 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 1 1 7 
 
 doubtful of all. The degree of severity of 
 control is a mere matter of opinion ; the fre- 
 quency of venereal disease in the general 
 population is also pretty much a matter of 
 opinion. If we could rely implicitly upon the 
 fairness of the men who furnish these opinions, 
 we could still attach little importance to them. 
 Under present circumstances, there are very 
 few who are not prejudiced either against reg- 
 ulation or in favor of it. Still, we may cite 
 the eminent Russian physician, Sturmer, as 
 authority for the statement that in Russian 
 cities, when the control is relaxed, disease in- 
 creases, and the reverse.^ 
 
 Of little value, if any, is the comparison of 
 morbidity in different cities. The amount of 
 disease may vary for reasons quite indepen- 
 dent of the system of control, since the extent 
 to which men indulge in vicious pleasures de- 
 pends largely upon their resources, upon the 
 moral tone of the community, and upon the 
 number and character of those who offer such 
 pleasures for sale. Moreover, the possibility 
 of knowing the exact amount of venereal dis- 
 ease varies from city to city. Accordingly, 
 
 ' Conference Internationale , Brussels, 1899 ; Compte Rendu, ire 
 Question, 40. 
 
ii8 The Social Evil 
 
 unless there is an exceedingly marked differ- 
 ence in respect to disease, unless it may be 
 shown to be exceedingly prevalent in one 
 place and almost absent in another, it is impos- 
 sible to demonstrate the influence of reeula- 
 tion in this way. As a fact, no reputable 
 author would venture to affirm that venereal 
 disease is more frequent in London or New 
 York than in Paris or Berlin. Assertions 
 based upon a pr'iori reasons are frequent 
 enough, but they stand or fall with the reason- 
 ing upon which they are based. 
 
 Accordingly, it is upon statistics of morbid- 
 ity for a period before and after the introduc- 
 tion or the abolition of regulation that we 
 must rely, if we are to get statistical proof at 
 all. Even here it is necessary' to note many 
 sources of error. Excepting in Norway, only 
 a fraction of the actual number of cases of 
 disease fall under official observation. From 
 the reports of public hospitals and from statis- 
 tics of disease in the army and navy, it is nec- 
 essary to infer the extent of venereal maladies 
 in the general population. But many causes 
 influence the number of those who apply for 
 admission to the public hospital. An eco- 
 nomic crisis, for example, might compel some 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 119 
 
 to seek admission who, under ordinary circum- 
 stances, would be treated by private physi- 
 cians. If military service is compulsory, 
 statistics for the entire army will show with 
 some fidelity the curve of disease in the whole 
 country. But if service is voluntary, disease 
 will vary with the class of men who enlist, 
 and that will in turn be affected by economic 
 and social causes too numerous to mention. 
 Changes may take place in the quality of 
 medical skill, so that cases of disease not 
 counted at one period will figure in the statis- 
 tics of another. Moreover, it is a well-known 
 fact that venereal disease is subject to great 
 fluctuations, the causes of which are not suf- 
 ficiently known. These fluctuations, while 
 often extending over a great part of Europe, 
 vary in degree from place to place. The ef- 
 fect of such fluctuations upon the statistical 
 problem is obvious. A “ spontaneous ” oscilla- 
 tion, coinciding in time with the introduction 
 or abolition of regulation, may greatly accen- 
 tuate or may altogether neutralize the effect 
 of the change.^ 
 
 ^ Report on Contagious Diseases Acts, 1882, x. Confirence Inter- 
 nationale, Brussels, 1899; Rapports PrPlhninaires, ire Question, 
 Augagneur, 61 ; Enquetes, i., Ehlers, 106 ; Enquetes, ii., Annexe, 
 Tommasoli, 39. 
 
120 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 Such is the gravity of this source of error 
 that so conservative a writer as Blaschko de- 
 clares that in consequence of it the results of 
 regulation, whatever they may be, either do 
 not appear at all, or appear very indistinctly. 
 
 Nevertheless, it may be worth while to de- 
 vote a brief space to such statistics as are most 
 often cited in proof of various theses. The 
 English venereal statistics may be taken first, 
 as they are the best known, and have fre- 
 quently been compared with the results of a 
 laboratory experiment. 
 
 By the Contagious Diseases Acts, put into 
 effect in 1866, twelve districts in England and 
 two in Ireland, chosen on account of the num- 
 ber of soldiers and sailors stationed there and 
 on account of the prevalence of venereal dis- 
 ease, were subjected to a system of regulation, 
 modelled, so far as its sanitary features were 
 concerned, after the Continental systems. In 
 1883 the Acts were suspended. Accordingly, 
 it is possible to study the effect upon the army 
 both of the introduction and of the abrogation 
 of the Acts. In order to eliminate, as far as 
 possible, the influence of the periodic oscilla- 
 tions of disease, the Parliamentary reporters 
 compared with the venereal statistics of the 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 1 2 1 
 
 fourteen subjected stations those of all unsub- 
 jected stations. 
 
 Primary Sores. Secondary Syphilis. Gonorrhoea. 
 Stations 
 
 not Stations Not No 
 
 Subjected. Subjected. Subjected. Subjected. Subjected. Subjected. 
 Per 1000 Men. 
 
 I86I-I866 
 
 103 
 
 109.7 
 
 30.7 
 
 37.4 
 
 108.2 
 
 125. 1 
 
 1867-1872 
 
 93-6 
 
 65-4 
 
 29.2 
 
 24.6 
 
 105.4 
 
 114.6 
 
 Decline 
 
 9^ 
 
 40^ 
 
 8% 
 
 34^ 
 
 3% 
 
 8% 
 
 1860-1863 
 
 116.3 
 
 129.8 
 
 30.5 
 
 40 
 
 1 16. 1 
 
 134.6 
 
 1870-1873 
 
 86 
 
 52.5 
 
 27-5 
 
 20.3 
 
 95 
 
 106.6 
 
 Decline 
 
 26$ 
 
 60% 
 
 10^ 
 
 49^ 
 
 18^ 
 
 24^' 
 
 The first impression created by these figures 
 is that a very considerable reduction in disease 
 is due to the Acts. But even a superficial ex- 
 amination is sufficient to show that the figures 
 are deceptive. 
 
 Under primary sores are included both pri- 
 mary syphilis and ulcus molle. The latter dis- 
 ease, being easily discovered and easily cured 
 when found, would naturally be the first to 
 yield to sanitary control.^ 
 
 It would be of the highest practical impor- 
 
 ^ Report, Contagious Diseases Acts, 1882, xi.-xiv. 
 
 ^ “ Prostitutes may conceal gonorrhoea, and physicians are not al- 
 ways able to determine whether or not a person is infected with 
 syphilis ; but ulcus molle will always be discovered if regulation is 
 efficient. Consequently, regulation will always have an influence upon 
 ulcus molle. With a good system it may become rare, and may even 
 disappear.’’ — Reimers, Conference Internationale, Brussels, l8gg; 
 Compte Rendu, ii., ire Question, g6. 
 
122 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 tance to know how far the improvement in the 
 subjected stations was due to the diminution in 
 this form of disease. Few would advocate a 
 system of regulation if its chief result were 
 merely to eliminate that comparatively harm- 
 less malady. 
 
 The figures for secondary syphilis are no 
 longer considered of any particular impor- 
 tance, since it is impossible to say where the 
 primary syphilis, of which the secondary is a 
 result, was contracted. The Parliamentary 
 reporters argue that in the shifting about of 
 troops, fewer cases of latent syphilis left the 
 subjected districts than were brought to them, 
 assuming that there is a constant ratio between 
 the number of cases of secondary syphilis and 
 that of primary, and assuming that primary 
 syphilis was less common in the subjected sta- 
 tions. The first of these assumptions is not 
 exactly true, and the second is not proven, 
 owing to the grouping of cases of the two 
 kinds of disease. In default of actual proof as 
 to the decline of primary syphilis, the statistics 
 for secondary syphilis are devoid of all sig- 
 nificance. 
 
 The decline in gonorrhoea is too slight to be 
 of much importance. Even if such a decline 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 123 
 
 were demonstrably due to regulation, one 
 would hardly find in it much of an argument 
 for the introduction of a system of regulation.^ 
 Accordingly, all that is proved by the statis- 
 tics of disease during the existence of the Acts 
 is that a reduction in primary lesions was ef- 
 fected. This is shown conclusively, it would 
 appear, by a comparison of the curve of pri- 
 mary sores in the fourteen subjected stations 
 and the curve for fourteen unsubjected sta- 
 tions chosen for the sake of comparison. 
 
 But even if we grant that a decline in pri- 
 mary syphilis took place, it still remains a 
 question whether any light is thrown upon the 
 problem of reglementation in large cities. 
 Most of the stations selected for the English 
 experiment were towns and small cities. A 
 moment’s reflection will show that in such 
 places the possibility of compelling all prosti- 
 tutes to comply with the regulations is infi- 
 nitely greater than in the great city. Clandes- 
 tine prostitution can thrive only in great centres 
 of population. 
 
 In a civil population, it seems reasonable 
 that a general belief in the safety of prostitu- 
 
 ' Kromayer, after a detailed study of the English statistics, con- 
 cludes that gonorrhoea was not really affected at all by the Acts. 
 
124 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 tion will increase the patronage of vice, and 
 thus neutralize to a certain extent whatever 
 sanitary benefit may be due to control. In an 
 army, the effect would probably be less marked, 
 since soldiers are generally men whose habits 
 are already formed, and who do not usually 
 look upon venereal diseases with as much 
 fear as does the civilian. Accordingly, there 
 is reason to look for a much greater improve- 
 ment in the health of an army, as a result of 
 regulation, than in the health of the general 
 population. 
 
 Norwegian statistics would seem to give 
 more useful information than do those of Eng- 
 land. In 1888 regulation was abolished for 
 all of Norway excepting Bergen and Trond- 
 hjem. From the figures of Holst, it appears 
 that immediately after the abolition of regula- 
 tion a rise in the number of cases of venereal 
 disease took place for all Norway.^ 
 
 The statistics for Norway present, however, 
 the same flaw that impairs the value of the 
 English statistics. They do not enable us to 
 know how far syphilis alone increased after the 
 abolition of regulation. Moreover, we cannot 
 
 ' Holst, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Enquetes, i., 
 128. 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 125 
 
 be certain that cases of disease were as care- 
 fully reported before 1888 as after that year. 
 In these respects the statistics for the city of 
 Christiania are far more satisfactory. The 
 curve of disease indicates that after the aboli- 
 tion of regulation, all three forms of venereal 
 disease increased. The increase is particu- 
 larly marked in the case of gonorrhoea.^ This 
 is somewhat surprising, since both a priori 
 reasons and the facts of experience would 
 lead one to expect a more radical change in the 
 curve of ulcus molle^ at least, than in that of 
 gonorrhoea. 
 
 The rise, however, is by no means suoh an 
 extraordinary one as would be expeeted by 
 those who look upon reglementation as the 
 solution of the sanitary problem. Moreover, 
 it is a question whether there were not other 
 forees at work which tended to increase the 
 volume of disease. From 1879 1888 the 
 
 population of Christiania increased from 116,- 
 801 to 138,319. By 1898 the population had 
 increased to about 220,000. The average an- 
 nual increase for the former period was less 
 than 2200; for the latter, about 8200. When 
 
 ' Holst, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Enquites, i., 
 126. 
 
126 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 it is remembered that the more rapid the 
 growth of a city is, the greater the proportion 
 of young and unmarried men and the greater 
 the relative volume of vice will be, it does not 
 seem unreasonable that an increase in disease 
 would have taken place even if reglementation 
 had not been abolished. 
 
 It is also a question whether 1888 did not 
 introduce a period of spontaneous increase in 
 venereal disease. The general oscillations of 
 disease are not confined to any single countr)". 
 Now, the nearest culminating point of syphilis 
 in Copenhagen was in i886, corresponding 
 with a similar point in Christiania in 1882. In 
 Copenhagen there was an abrupt descent of 
 the curve of syphilis, reaching the lowest point 
 in 1892, then rising again.^ 
 
 At Lyons, a decline from 1883 to 1888 was 
 followed by an increase from 1889 to 1893. 
 At Paris, a decrease from 1883 to 1888 was 
 followed by an increase. In Colmar, the de- 
 cline continued from 1882 to 1887, followed by 
 an increase in 1888 and 1889.^ In the Italian 
 army, a decline from 1881 to 1888 was fol- 
 
 ' Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899; Enquetes,\., ro6. 
 
 * Augagneur, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1S99 ; Rapports 
 Freiiminaires, ire Question, 61. 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 127 
 
 lowed by an increase. Augagneur states that, 
 for about the same period, the same thing is 
 true of the French and English armies. Ac- 
 cordingly, it is an open question whether the 
 increase that followed the abolition of regula- 
 tion in Norway was due to it. 
 
 In Italy, a system of regulation which had 
 been in force for about thirty years was 
 abolished, nominally, in 1888. As a fact, the 
 ministry did everything possible to discredit 
 abolition. Statistics were collected and abused 
 especially to that end. Moreover, the sanitary 
 regulations were still enforced in many cities, 
 in spite of the law. Accordingly, the statistics 
 of Italy are worthless, so far as showing the 
 effect of regulation is concerned.^ The statis- 
 tics of the Italian army show that after 1888 
 an increase in venereal disease did actually 
 take place. But it cannot be demonstrated 
 that the increase was due to the “ abolition ” 
 of regulation. It was just as probably in part 
 or wholly due to “ spontaneous ” oscillation. 
 
 The statistics of isolated cities or towns which 
 have adopted or discontinued sanitary control 
 are sometimes cited as proof of the efficacy of 
 
 ’ Tommasoli, Conference Internationale, Brussels, 1899 ; En- 
 quetes, ii., Annexe. 
 
128 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 regulation. It is obvious that such statistics 
 can be of little value, unless the city is a great 
 one, and unless the system is enforced for a 
 number of years. Upon the introduction of 
 a system of control, it is the most natural thing 
 for prostitutes who know they are diseased to 
 move to another town. It is only by degrees 
 that they learn that it is possible to evade regu- 
 lations that are inconvenient for them. Un- 
 doubtedly, such emigration would have an 
 immediate salutary effect upon the city from 
 which they go. The effect upon the country 
 as a whole is, however, practically nil. The 
 experience of Colmar, a small city in Upper 
 Alsace, and of Glasgow, would seem to indi- 
 cate that a policy of absolute repression would 
 have the same effect. It is unfortunate that 
 we have no reliable statistics for a great city 
 which has introduced a really scientific system 
 of regulation. For a small city, the town of 
 Dorpat in Livonia has probably been more 
 successful in making a good showing than any 
 other. That city had always been noted for 
 the severity of venereal disease, and was con- 
 sidered especially dangerous as a station for 
 troops. In 1898, after three years of really 
 efficient regulation, the commandant of the 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 1 29 
 
 garrison reported that not one of the thousand 
 men stationed there had contracted primary 
 syphilis during the yeard 
 
 The most absurdly imperfect experiment 
 upon which arguments were ever based was 
 that of St. Louis, from 1870-1874. According 
 to this regulation, the city was divided into six 
 districts. One physician in each district was 
 to visit the houses of prostitution and the 
 apartments where isolated prostitutes lived, and 
 might make physical examinations if he thought 
 it necessary. It is easy to imagine how much 
 chance there was of detecting disease under 
 such a system of regulation. The claim has 
 been made that the number of prostitutes 
 diminished, as well it may have done, since 
 many prostitutes would prefer other cities, 
 where they were free, to one in which they 
 were taxed and controlled. It has been claimed 
 by some that venereal disease diminished ; by 
 others, that it increased ; neither claim being 
 supported by facts worth anything. For all 
 anyone knows, disease may have decreased or 
 it may have increased. Whatever the change 
 in morbidity, such regulations can hardly be 
 credited with it. 
 
 Strohmberg, op. cit., 206. 
 
130 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 In view of the above considerations, it is no 
 wonder that the enlightened supporters as well 
 as the enlightened opponents of reglementa- 
 tion are practically agreed upon rejecting such 
 statistics as we have at present, preferring to 
 rely upon a priori reasoning and common 
 sensed 
 
 If it were true that the enormous sanitary 
 improvements that the supporters of regula- 
 tion expect from it could be realized, or if 
 regulation brought about the thorough-going 
 demoralization that its opponents dread, statis- 
 tics, imperfect as they are, would show it. But 
 since the influence, whatever it may be, is com- 
 paratively slight, statistics cannot possibly es- 
 tablish it beyond cavil. 
 
 It is, then, upon common sense that one is 
 compelled to rely in deciding whether, with all 
 its imperfections, existing regulation does much 
 
 * “ It is a long time that I have studied statistics. Well, I do not 
 believe that there are any that are of value.” — Fournier, Confirence 
 Inter nationale, Brussels, 1899 ; Compte Rendrt, ire Question, 29. 
 
 “ It is my conviction, based upon studies continued, I am almost 
 sorry to say, through years, that one cannot prove, by statistics, the 
 effect of regulation of prostitution upon the spread of venereal dis- 
 ease.” — Neisser, ibid., 35. 
 
 “In general, one believes no statistics but his own. One may 
 support a thesis by statistical data, but he will never convince an 
 adversary by arguments of that kind.” — Lassar, ibid., 33. 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 13 1 
 
 good. However imperfect the system may be, 
 it nevertheless remains that many prostitutes 
 who are capable of transmitting disease are 
 discovered and sent to the hospital. The gist 
 of the matter, according to Tarnowsky, is that 
 a syphilitic prostitute when locked up in a hos- 
 pital is less dangerous to society than when 
 she is at large.* ** 
 
 Burlereaux, according to Barthelemy, ob- 
 served thirty-five soldiers of a battalion in- 
 fected with syphilis by the same woman. 
 Would it not have been an advantage to have 
 locked her up before so much damage had 
 been done ? 
 
 Dr. Commenge has estimated the probable 
 good due to Parisian regulation.^ From 1887 
 to 1897, 15,095 prostitutes have been sent to 
 the hospital of the prison of St. Lazare to be 
 treated for syphilis. Assuming that the aver- 
 age period of confinement was thirty days and 
 that each one would have contaminated ten 
 men, 150,950 men have been saved from a 
 horrible disease. 
 
 There is something childish about such 
 
 * op. cit., 318. 
 
 ** Conference Internationale, Brussels, iSgg ; Communications, i.. 
 Appendix, 125. 
 
132 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 reasoning as this. If venereal disease is as 
 frightfully prevalent among the clandestine 
 prostitutes as all supporters of regulation claim, 
 and if the clandestine so far outnumber the 
 registered prostitutes as they also claim, then 
 the man who is saved from the great probabil- 
 ity of being infected by the diseased registered 
 prostitute runs almost as great a risk of infec- 
 tion from other prostitutes. Common sense 
 would admit that the risk is less, but how much 
 less it is puerile to attempt to discover. One 
 may be pretty sure that some of Burlereaux’s 
 thirty-five soldiers would have contracted 
 syphilis elsewhere ; but omniscience alone 
 would make it possible to know how many. 
 
 It is obvious that if the number of prosti- 
 tutes controlled is a small fraction of the total 
 number, the value of control is zero, since the 
 number of diseased actually removed from 
 active commerce is but an infinitesimal part of 
 the volume of disease to which the patrons of 
 prostitution habitually expose themselves.^ 
 Regulation may be worth less than zero, if an 
 impression of safety is produced without ade. 
 quate reason.^ 
 
 ' Strohmberg, op. cit., 144. 
 
 ’“The public believes that this service ” (sanitary control) “is 
 
Effectiveness of Sanitary Control 133 
 
 How near the efficiency of existing systems 
 is to the zero point it is impossible to say. 
 Some reliance may, however, be placed upon 
 the opinions of those who have spent much of 
 their life in studying the subject. It is worth 
 noting that Parent-Duchatelet, Behrend,Hugel, 
 and almost all other writers of the first half of 
 the nineteenth century, also many present-day 
 writers in America,^ never doubted that im- 
 
 very easy ; that since the women have a direct professional interest 
 in being well, there are practically no refractory ones at all, and that 
 it is possible to have commerce with them without fear as though 
 free from danger. It is here that the danger lies ; it is this security 
 that is perilous, since a man exposes himself without the habitual 
 precautions.” — Ba.Tth.i\&m.y,Conf&ence Iniernationale,Brussels,\?)()()-, 
 Rapports PrBiminaires, ire Question, 5. 
 
 * “ One thing is certain, everyone agrees, — the partisans of regu- 
 lation not excepted, — that the methods actually in use for diminish- 
 ing the evils of prostitution cannot be considered effective. The 
 organization and administration of the surveillance, medical and 
 police, are so defective, in our opinion, that but little is to be ex- 
 pected from it.” — Neisser, Bulletin de la Socidte Internationale de 
 Prophylaxie Sanitaire et Morale, I., i. 
 
 “ I am asked, ' Are you satisfied with the existing regulations ? ’ 
 — ‘ No.’ — ‘ But you speak well of them.’ — ‘ Yes, for they do a little 
 good."’ — Fournier, Conference Internationale, Brussels, l8gg; Compte 
 Rendu, ire Question, 100. 
 
 “ A system of regulation in which arbitrary methods of registra- 
 tion are employed, which does not realize the purposes of sanitary 
 inspection, which cripples the utility of compulsory treatment 
 through premature dismissal from the hospital, — such a system of 
 regulation is certainly of little value.” — Tarnowsky, op. cit., 205. 
 
 Augagneur and Blaschko are inclined to deny that existing systems 
 of regulation do any good at all. Kromayer is certain that one of 
 
134 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 mense sanitary advantages from control were 
 easily demonstrated. Modern authorities, on 
 the other hand, are content to claim for regu- 
 lation merely a modicum of good, or look 
 upon it as a stock upon which really useful 
 control may be grafted. 
 
 the most serious diseases, gonorrhoea, is not influenced in the least 
 by regulation as it exists. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 PROBABLE EFFECTIVENESS OF REGLEMENTATION 
 IN NEW YORK 
 
 The problems which reglementation has to 
 solve differ from city to city. Accordingly, it 
 is not sufficient for the present purpose to 
 show how far it has succeeded in other cities ; 
 but each problem relating to reglementation 
 must be considered with respect to the legal 
 institutions, the racial and local characteristics, 
 the social and economic conditions of the city 
 of immediate interest — New York. 
 
 The legal question is obviously one which 
 can be decided only by legal specialists. It is 
 in a way preliminary to all further discussion, 
 since constitutional obstacles to reglementa- 
 tion, if such exist, are practically insurmounta- 
 ble. The regulation of prostitution can be a 
 burning question only in the large city ; and 
 even if it were agreed by the inhabitants of 
 the city that reglementation is expedient, the 
 hostility or indifference of the country at large 
 
 135 
 
136 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 would make it impossible to carry a constitu- 
 tional amendment for the sake of its realization. 
 
 All that can be attempted here is to state 
 the problem, and to indicate the main theories 
 that have been advanced for its solution. 
 
 The essential features of a system of regie- 
 mentation are the periodical examination and 
 treatment in the lock-hospital for venereal 
 diseases. No legal difficulty would arise if the 
 prostitute could be induced to submit to the 
 rules voluntarily. But a very large class will 
 never submit ; hence compulsion is absolutely 
 necessary if the system is to be effective. 
 Manifestly, it would be impossible to impose 
 compulsory physical examinations and impris- 
 onment for extended treatment without de- 
 priving the persons subjected to them of a 
 large share of their personal liberty. 
 
 The most familiar line of defence for such a 
 f restriction upon individual liberty is the dec- 
 laration that prostitution is a status, analogous 
 to the military status, which limits the civil 
 
 V rights of the individual and subjects him to 
 special regulations and, possibly, to special 
 tribunals. This is practically the view of Eu- 
 ropean reglementists. It is doubtful, however, 
 whether American constitutional law would 
 
Effectiveness of Reglementation 137 
 
 admit the right of a legislature to create a 
 special status of this kind. 
 
 A second manner of defending reglementa- 
 tion is to classify prostitution with occupations 
 that are subject to police regulation, such as 
 cab-driving, the keeping of a hotel, and the 
 like. Regulations may decide under what con- 
 ditions such a trade may be carried on and 
 under what conditions it is not permissible. 
 Infractions of the rules may be subject to 
 special penalties. The periodical examination 
 could, perhaps, be defended in such a manner.^ 
 Physical examination would be a condition 
 precedent to the exercise of the trade. But 
 imprisonment for treatment would seem to be 
 more difficult to defend. Would it be possible 
 to imprison a cabman whose license has been 
 revoked and who is suspected of intending to 
 carry on his occupation unauthorized ? Such 
 a procedure seems to be perfectly analogous 
 to the forcible detention of the diseased pros- 
 titute. Accordingly, reglementation must dis- 
 cover some other basis than that of special 
 regulation of a special trade. 
 
 ' It may be remarked that in Russia, workers in factories are 
 theoretically subject to periodical physical examinations, and that in 
 Posen all barmaids are subjected to such examination before enter- 
 ing upon a position. 
 
138 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 But whether prostitution is viewed as a 
 special status or a special occupation, some 
 clear definition of prostitution and some work- 
 able method of establishing the fact of prosti- 
 tution are essential. It is absurd to believe that 
 the mere suspicion of police agents or the mere 
 fact of venereal disease would be sufficient in 
 America, as it is in France and Germany, to 
 prove that a woman belongs to the status of 
 professional prostitution, or exercises prostitu- 
 tion as a regular trade, so long as she denies the 
 fact. Legal proof would be absolutely neces- 
 sary for placing a woman in such a status or 
 class, and such proof must necessarily in the 
 majority of cases be difficult, if not impossible, 
 to obtain. 
 
 Another common method of providing a 
 legal basis for reglementation is to bring it 
 under the class of police regulations for pre- 
 venting the spread of contagious diseases. 
 The analogy between the compulsory treat- 
 ment of venereal disease and the isolation of 
 those who suffer from other contagious mal- 
 adies, would, perhaps, be perfect if all venereal 
 patients were subjected to the same treatment. 
 This would, however, be Impossible under 
 present conditions ; and to make the regulation 
 
Effectiveness of Reglementation 139 
 
 apply to a special class only, would, of course, 
 require the creation of such a special class, and 
 thus would raise the difficulties which have 
 been pointed out above. 
 
 A fourth plan is that of restoring ancient 
 laws making prostitution a crime or a misde- 
 meanor and of leaving to the police courts dis- 
 cretionary power as to the penalties imposed. 
 It is conceivable that by a series of legal fic- 
 tions the diseased prostitutes might be sub- 
 jected to imprisonment in hospitals, while 
 those not found to be diseased might be per- 
 mitted to go unpunished. If such a procedure 
 is not unconstitutional, it would probably pro- 
 vide a sufficient basis for a system of sanitary 
 regulation of vice. The difficulty would still 
 remain that sufficient proof of prostitution 
 would be required, — a difficulty which is prac- 
 tically insurmountable. 
 
 It remains to be considered whether it would 
 be possible to overcome the natural objections 
 of women of this class to police regulations, so 
 that submission to its rules might be voluntary. 
 This could only be done by granting special 
 privileges to those who submit. A relentless 
 persecution of those who do not submit to the 
 regulations and immunity from arrest to those 
 
140 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 who do submit, would undoubtedly drive many 
 to accept registration and periodical examina- 
 tion as the lesser of two evils. Accordingly, 
 the question of regulation based upon quasi- 
 voluntary inscription resolves itself into the 
 question of the possibility of coping wdth 
 “ clandestine ” or unsubjected prostitution. 
 
 The first question to be considered has to 
 do with the efficiency of the police organiza- 
 tion itself. Experience has shown conclu- 
 sively that for the morals service, special 
 agents, endowed with rare qualities of tact, 
 shrewdness and integrity, are necessary. 
 Doubtless the materials for a special force of 
 agents can be found in an American city. But 
 it stands to reason that it would take time to 
 organize as efficient a force as that of Paris or 
 Berlin. For this reason, it must be expected 
 that for a time excess of caution, varied by 
 unfortunate excess of zeal, would mar the 
 working of the system. This defect would 
 cure itself with time, however, and so may be 
 dismissed. 
 
 But, granted a force of the highest degree 
 of efficiency, it is evident that the problem of 
 coping with clandestine prostitution in New 
 York would be exceptionally difficult. The 
 
Effectiveness of Reglementation 141 
 
 freedom with which women and girls of good 
 character frequent public places unattended, or 
 pass through the streets alone in the evening, 
 is not paralleled in any European city. In 
 Paris, Lecour could arrest a young woman 
 who waited for her husband at the door of 
 a shop, “ because no decent woman lingered 
 upon the sidewalk.” Imagine a New York 
 agent of police acting upon such inferences ! 
 It is needless to dwell upon this fact, since 
 anyone can understand that American habits 
 of life make it possible for a discreet prostitute 
 to exercise her vocation much longer without 
 rousing the suspicion of a limited force of 
 police agents than she could possibly do in 
 Paris or Berlin. 
 
 A second consideration is the greater diffi- 
 culty that an American morals police would 
 find in acting upon its suspicions. On the Con- 
 tinent of Europe a person generally lives more 
 or less under the eyes of the police. Birth 
 certificates, passports, employment cards, and 
 the like are in fairly general use, so that it is 
 not difficult for the police to have an insight 
 into the antecedents and means of livelihood of 
 the resident population. It is easy to see how 
 such data would be of the utmost importance 
 
142 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 in segregating that part of the population 
 which will bear watching. The antecedents 
 of any person who may immigrate into a city 
 are likewise easily determined. But in New 
 York the police would have no help from such 
 data. A secret service, however ubiquitous, 
 could acquaint itself with the life of only a 
 fraction of the population of New York. 
 
 Again, it makes much difference whether the 
 vicious element in the population is very migra- 
 tory in its habits or not. It takes time before 
 the conduct of a new arrival draws suspicion. 
 Still more time elapses before the suspicion is 
 sufficiently strong to justify police action. 
 The person observed may be ready to remove 
 to another city, or to another part of the same 
 city, before anything can be done to fix her 
 status. 
 
 The prostitute is notorious everywhere for 
 her migratory habits. Self-interest may, how- 
 ever, compel her to remain in the same city 
 when her whims would lead her to migrate. A 
 city which is preeminently the centre of the life 
 of a whole country will naturally be the place 
 to which prostitutes will flock, and whence they 
 may usually depart only with loss in earning 
 power. Paris and Berlin occupy such posi- 
 tions. New York, on the other hand, is only 
 
Effectiveness of Reglementation 143 
 
 one, although the greatest one, of a number of 
 great American cities. As a centre of profes- 
 sional vice, it would be scarcely more attractive 
 than Philadelphia or Chicago, or even a num- 
 ber of lesser cities. What is more, the far 
 greater incomes of American prostitutes make 
 it easier for them to move from place to place 
 than it is for European prostitutes. 
 
 In view of these considerations, it is evident 
 that the problem of combating clandestine pros- 
 titution in New York is far more difficult than 
 in European cities. One fact is, however, to 
 be set against these, and that is that the occa- 
 sional prostitute, who merely ekes out an in- 
 sufficient wage by vicious earnings, is probably 
 less common in New York than in Berlin, and 
 perhaps than in Paris. And this is the most 
 difficult to cope with of all forms of clandes- 
 tine prostitution. 
 
 It remains to consider whether it would be 
 possible to retain as efficient a control over 
 prostitutes once registered as it is in European 
 cities. This also seems doubtful. It is well 
 known that prostitutes are more or less refrac- 
 tory, according to the characteristics of the 
 people from whom they spring. The American 
 impatience of authority would certainly make 
 itself manifest in the spirit with which these 
 
144 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 women would obey regulations. The Parisian 
 authorities find great difficulty in following up 
 the prostitutes who withdraw themselves from 
 control by changing their habitations. In view 
 of American notions of inviolability of domi- 
 cile, it is hard to see why it would not be very 
 easy for a prostitute to drop out of sight alto- 
 gether by merely moving from one part of the 
 city to another. Moreover, if diseased, she 
 would be exceedingly likely to prefer a few 
 months’ sojourn in another city to a period of 
 confinement in a lock-hospital. And while the 
 amount of disease originating in Nev/ York 
 might be diminished, the amount of disease in 
 the country as a whole would remain practically 
 the same. Under such conditions, it is evident 
 that no permanent advance in the combating 
 of venereal disease could be made, since a 
 momentary relaxation of reglementation would 
 mean a restoration of the conditions prevailing 
 before its introduction. 
 
 In almost every respect, then. New York 
 presents a more difficult problem with respect 
 to reglementation than Paris or Berlin. If 
 reglementation does only a “ little good ” in 
 the latter cities, it would necessarily do less 
 good in New York. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 MORAL REGULATION OF VICE 
 
 It is customary to speak as though there 
 were but three possible ways of dealing with 
 prostitution, absolute laissez faire, absolute 
 prohibition of vice, and reglementation. 
 
 It is very cogently argued that laissez faire 
 is an inadmissible policy. Not only does 
 venereal disease extend its ravages unchecked, 
 but every sort of moral iniquity thrives where- 
 ever vice is a law unto itself. With equal co- 
 gency it is argued that no human legislator can 
 make vicious men or women virtuous, or pre- 
 serve so close a surveillance over them as to 
 prevent the exercise of their evil propensities. 
 Thus, by a process of exclusion, reglementa- 
 tion is arrived at as the only rational policy for 
 Government to pursue. 
 
 It is difficult to understand how such naive 
 reasoning can still be entertained by thinking 
 men. Regulative and repressive systems dif- 
 fer in emphasis, rather than in essence. The 
 
 145 
 
146 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 first aim of the reglementist is to check dis- 
 ease ; he recognizes, however, the gravity of 
 vice in itself, and admits that no measures 
 that may limit its volume are to be disre- 
 garded. The opponent of reglementation, 
 while believing that vice itself is an evil that 
 completely overshadows any hygienic effects 
 that result from it, will generally admit that 
 all means for combating venereal disease 
 should be adopted, provided that they are not 
 directly antagonistic to moral ends. Accord- 
 ingly, we find many elements, both moral and 
 sanitary, upon which both parties agree. A 
 system of control based upon such common 
 elements and supplemented somewhat as com- 
 mon sense suggests, would escape the serious 
 charge, now brought against reglementation, 
 of making itself ancillary to prostitution, and 
 would at the same time be free from the moral 
 and hygienic futility of violent repression. 
 Such a system would abandon the task of 
 effecting the impossible, in either morals or 
 hygiene, and would reserve the powers at its 
 command for the bringing about of such ameli- 
 orations as experience and reason have shown 
 to be possible. Such a system we may term 
 the Moral Regulation of Vice, since it would 
 
Moral Regulation of Vice 147 
 
 never lose sight of the fact that moral consid- 
 erations are of paramount importance. 
 
 Repressive Features in Moral Control . — 
 The first point upon which all are agreed is 
 the necessity of suppressing, so far as possible, 
 flagrant incitement to debauch. Solicitation 
 upon the street and in public places should be 
 restrained ; haunts of vice should be compelled 
 to assume the appearance of decency ; in short, 
 every method of conspicuous advertising of 
 vice should be done away with. It is ad-‘ 
 mitted that this can be only approximately 
 accomplished. The prostitute will always con- 
 trive to make her presence known. But much 
 would be gained if vice could be made rela- 
 tively inconspicuous except to its votaries. 
 The constant presence of women known to be 
 immoral serves to recruit each year the patron- 
 age of prostitution by inciting to vice many 
 who would not of themselves have sought 
 illicit pleasures. From this point of view, it is 
 far better that prostitutes should be clandes- 
 tine in fact as well as in name than that they 
 should appear in their true colors. A sys- 
 tem which places moral ends before sanitary 
 would be just as capable of dealing with this 
 part of the problem as one which regards 
 
148 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 sanitary ends as paramount. As a practical fact, 
 the former system would encounter less diffi- 
 culty than the latter, since the exigencies of 
 sanitary control require that a certain latitude 
 of flagrancy should be given to the licensed 
 prostitute.^ 
 
 The pernicious effect of a league between 
 vice and legitimate pleasures has been men- 
 tioned above.^ Especially dangerous is vice in 
 public drinking-places. Women are engaged 
 to persuade men to drink alcoholic liquors to 
 excess ; the effects of alcohol, in turn, lend 
 service to vice. To what proportions this evil 
 may grow, the Parisian brasseries a femmes 
 (drinking-places with female service) will 
 show. It will doubtless be impossible to keep 
 the saloon absolutely free from the presence of 
 prostitution, and to prohibit absolutely the sale 
 of intoxicants in brothels. But a policy which 
 I should revoke the license of a saloonkeeper 
 I who permits unattended women to frequent his 
 \ premises in the evening and night would assist 
 ^ in driving vice from the saloon proper. A 
 supplemental policy of discouraging the sale of 
 liquors in so-called hotels would be needed to 
 make the plan effective. 
 
 ' Sufra, 87, note. 
 
 * Supra, 87. 
 
Moral Regulation of Vice 149 
 
 In like manner, the dancing hall or music 
 hall which lends itself to the purposes of vice 
 is a public nuisance and could be reached by 
 the police whenever immorality becomes fla- 
 grantly conspicuous. 
 
 Vice will naturally take refuge in private 
 houses if denied the use of public places. It 
 would still require regulation to keep it within 
 the bounds of decency. It is in vain that it is 
 driven into privacy if by conspicuous lights or 
 signs or by noisy music it is permitted to make 
 its presence notorious. An English law of the 
 present day makes it possible to close a house 
 if it is shown by the testimony of two responsi- 
 ble citizens to be used for immoral purposes.* 
 While it is doubtful whether such a law would 
 have any other effect than that of breaking up 
 the house of ill fame and compelling prosti- 
 tutes to resort to solicitation upon the street, 
 an analogous measure which should permit 
 aggrieved neighbors to close a house which is 
 obtrusively devoted to immorality would be a 
 most efficient force in compelling such estab- 
 lishments to conceal their true character. 
 
 We may here consider whether moral ends 
 
 ' The mere fact that men and women resort to a house in such a 
 way as to give good ground for suspicion is accepted as presumptive 
 proof. 
 
The Social Evil 
 
 150 
 
 are best subserved by relegating vice to a 
 single quarter of the city. It is a serious ques- 
 tion whether the house of ill fame, situated in 
 a respectable locality and compelled to pre- 
 serve an outward air of decency, is as danger- 
 ous to the community at large as a similar 
 establishment surrounded by others of a like 
 character and hence not under compulsion to 
 refrain from flagrant devices for increasing its 
 patronage.^ 
 
 Preventive Features . — A second point upon 
 which all parties will agree, is the desirability 
 of keeping growing children free from contact 
 with professional vice. The child who knows 
 all evil is almost destined to share in it. No 
 child over three years of age should be per- 
 mitted in a house where prostitution is carried 
 on.^ In tenement and flat-houses, parents of 
 children should be able to bring complaint 
 against tenants of tenements or flats in the 
 same building when suspicion is created that 
 prostitution is carried on in such tenements ; 
 and if the suspicion is found to be based upon 
 reasonable grounds, the courts should require 
 
 
 ' Supra. 45 et seq. 
 
 ^ In Continental cities, the inmates of brothels are not permitted 
 to keep even their own children with them after the third or fourth 
 year. 
 
Moral Regulation of Vice 15 1 
 
 the landlord to evict the suspected parties. 
 The evil is one of such gravity that it would 
 seem to justify a measure which interferes, to 
 a certain extent, with the principle of inviola- 
 bility of domicile. 
 
 Even where the children of the poor are not 
 in immediate contact with professional vice, 
 their surroundings are frequently highly in- 
 imical to virtue. Where a whole family, adults 
 and children of both sexes, is crowded together 
 in a single room, moral degradation is almost 
 inevitable. What the effects of such condi- 
 tions may be, can be judged from the fact that 
 in European cities an appreciable proportion 
 of the prostitutes who are brought up in such 
 circumstances trace their fall to incestuous re- 
 lations. The problem is one of the most in- 
 tricate with which society has to deal, since the 
 incomes of the poor and the rents which they 
 have to pay are almost entirely fixed by laws 
 over which Government has little control. 
 Nevertheless, the question may be raised 
 whether it is not possible, by means of restric- 
 tions upon the building and letting of houses, 
 to discourage the formation of quarters that 
 inevitably entail upon the community a most 
 serious burden of vice and disease. 
 
152 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 It has often been suggested that the present 
 system of public education does not exhaust 
 its possibilities as a moralizing force. Fre- 
 quently, the child who leaves the public school 
 loses the only influence that makes for mor- 
 ality, and at the time when the need for such 
 influence is greatest. There seems to be little 
 doubt that an extension of the years of public 
 education for children whose parents or guard- 
 ians cannot show that they are engaged in 
 satisfactory employment or properly cared for 
 in their homes, would diminish the evil of pros- 
 titution of young girls. The child who is left 
 free to pursue her own inclinations, or who is 
 employed by unscrupulous parties, has always 
 been the easiest prey of the professional se- 
 ducer. Such additional education should natu- 
 rally be of a kind that would train the pupils 
 for industrial or household duties. It must be 
 remembered that many girls become prosti- 
 tutes simply because they are so deficient in 
 training as to be incapable of earning their 
 ^ living in any other way. 
 
 All students of the social evil understand 
 how serious the problem of the prostitution of 
 minors has become. Whether sanitary or 
 moral ends are considered to be of paramount 
 
Moral Regulation of Vice 153 
 
 importance, the prostitution of children cannot 
 be tolerated. The supporters of reglementa- 
 tion have for decades pleaded for the establish- 
 ment of reformatories or asylums for the rescue 
 of young girls who have fallen into evil ways, 
 or who are in danger of falling. The Morals 
 Service constantly has to deal with children 
 who are much too young to be registered as 
 public prostitutes, but who nevertheless gain 
 their living by professional vice. All that the 
 judges can do is to give a useless warning, and 
 to send them back to conditions in which 
 moral improvement is impossible. In cities 
 where no attempt is made to regulate vice, the 
 general public is ignorant of the extent of this 
 evil. 
 
 A Prussian law of July, 1900,^ presents the 
 first systematic attempt to grapple with this 
 problem. By the provisions of this law, girls 
 under eighteen who are found to be living a 
 vicious life, or who fall into evil company so 
 that they are in danger of being led into 
 immorality, may be placed in institutions or 
 under the charge of parties who will be respon- 
 sible for their conduct. If necessary, they 
 may be kept under guardianship until their 
 
 ' Das Fzirsorge-Erziehungs-Gesetz, July 2, 1900. 
 
154 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 twenty-first year. These provisions are applic- 
 able both to those whose parents or guardians 
 connive at their downfall, and to those who 
 cannot be controlled by their natural guard- 
 ians. This law represents the, consensus of 
 opinion of the most profound students of the 
 social evil. 
 
 Sanitary Features . — A system of moral con- 
 trol would not abandon all of the sanitary fea- 
 tures that are embodied in reglementation. 
 Both systems alike demand that general prac- 
 titioners should be required to possess a high 
 degree of knowledge in the treatment of 
 venereal maladies. Both systems agree that 
 the quack physician who practically fosters 
 disease for his own ends should be eliminated.^ 
 f Treatment for venereal disease should be 
 \ within the reach of all. The cost of adequate 
 treatment for the more serious forms of vene- 
 real maladies is so great that the vast majority 
 of patients cannot be treated at all except at 
 public hospitals and dispensaries. These 
 should, accordingly, be numerous enough to 
 furnish gratuitous treatment to all who desire 
 it. Patients should be encouraged to appear 
 for treatment ; every care should be taken to 
 
 ' This has already been accomplished in England. 
 
Moral Regulation of Vice 155 
 
 insure them against exposure, since many 
 would rather endure their maladies in secret 
 than permit it to be known that they suffer 
 from a “ shameful disease.” If publicity can- 
 not be avoided at public dispensaries, it would 
 be for the general welfare to designate offi- 
 cially private physicians in each quarter of the 
 city who should treat such patients free of 
 charge, receiving their compensation from the 
 public treasury.^ 
 
 Objection will doubtless be raised that 
 such measures would minimize the deterrent 
 effect that is exercised by venereal disease 
 upon those who wish to indulge in vice. It is 
 a sufficient answer that the chronic results of 
 disease are frequently even more disastrous to 
 
 ' According to Dr. Prince A. Morrow {The Prophylaxis of Ve?te- 
 real Disease), the vast majority of syphilitic patients do not receive 
 adequate treatment. “ Not one in twenty, certainly not one in ten, 
 receives a treatment sufficiently prolonged.” The city of New York 
 provides twenty-six beds for the treatment of female venereal pa- 
 tients. For male patients there are fifty-six beds in the City Hospi- 
 tal and a small number in the Metropolitan Hospital. It seems 
 almost incredible that, at the dispensaries, women patients are re- 
 ceived in the same room with men, so that the fact that they suffer 
 from secret maladies becomes known. Such a policy reminds 
 one of that pursued by Parisian hospitals toward venereal patients 
 during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ; They were well 
 cudgelled upon their admission and upon their discharge, in order 
 that the fact might be impressed upon them that they suffered from 
 a shameful disease. 
 
The Social Evil 
 
 156. 
 
 innocent parties than to the sufferer himself. 
 Moreover, the immediate consequences of dis- 
 ease are sufficiently grave to act as a deter- 
 rent for those who can be deterred from vice 
 by fear of disease. It is doubtful whether 
 the distantly remote consequences are weighed 
 at all. 
 
 Finally, a system of moral control cannot 
 overlook the fact that venereal disease is fre- 
 quently transmitted to innocent persons. Most 
 frequently, this results from the fact that men 
 who believe that they are completely cured of 
 such diseases still retain chronic accidents by 
 which they transmit disease to their innocent 
 wives. It is difficult to see how this evil can 
 be remedied except by the requirement, as a 
 preliminary condition to the issuing of a mar- 
 riage license, of a certificate from an official 
 physician showing the present state of health 
 of each of the contracting parties. Such a 
 requirement would work no real hardship to 
 anyone, since few persons who suspected the 
 existence of a disease of this kind would apply 
 for an official examination before health had 
 been restored. It will be admitted that many 
 difficulties would arise in the administration 
 of such a law, and that it could only diminish 
 
Moral Regulation of Vice 157 
 
 somewhat the evil which it is designed to 
 meet. The evil in question is, however, one 
 of so revolting a nature that any amelioration 
 would be worth a heavy cost. 
 
 For the administration of any system of 
 control of vice, experience has demonstrated 
 that a special body of police agents is required. 
 If the ordinary police are permitted to arrest 
 suspected prostitutes, or to raid houses of 
 prostitution, the responsibility for the care of 
 public morals is dissipated and unlimited op- 
 portunities for blackmail are created. The 
 system which leaves the initiative to the pri- 
 vate citizen is inadequate. The citizen may 
 be trusted to do whatever lies in his power to 
 prevent resorts in his immediate vicinity from 
 becoming especially offensive to decency. This 
 part of the system of control may wisely be 
 left to him. But for the discovery of prostitu- 
 tion of minors, for the control of prostitution 
 in public places and upon the street, a limited 
 body of agents selected for exceptional quali- 
 ties of tact and integrity is absolutely essential. 
 Under a system of reglementation, the agents 
 are handicapped by the fact that much of their 
 time must be spent in hunting down prostitutes 
 who fail to appear for periodic examination. 
 
158 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 Divested of this responsibility, their efficiency 
 in preventing the worst forms of vice would 
 be vastly increased. 
 
 For the introduction of a system of control 
 embodying the above features several State 
 laws would be needed. But whereas regie- 
 mentation would with difficulty find a place 
 under the Constitution, a system of moral con- 
 trol would be open to no objections on the 
 score of constitutional law. What is of greater 
 importance, any good that might result from 
 reglementation is fatally tainted with evil ; 
 whatever good might result from moral con- 
 trol is good unmixed. Reglementation would 
 arouse the uncompromising hostility of a great 
 part of the community ; intelligent moral con- 
 trol would meet with the approval of all, 
 excepting of those who are not satisfied with 
 a plan which would only gradually bring about 
 moral and sanitary improvement, and who 
 dream that there is some royal road to the 
 instant abolition of either moral or sanitary 
 evil. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 THE “ RAINES LAW HOTEL ” AND THE SOCIAL EVIL 
 
 No one who has lived in New York City can have 
 failed to realize that there is a close connection between 
 what is popularly known as the “Raines Law hotel” 
 and professional vice. The term is rapidly coming to 
 be synonymous with house of assignation. This does 
 not mean that there are not many so-called hotels, 
 organized for the sole purpose of evading the Raines 
 Law, which have remained completely free from prosti- 
 tution. Yet it can hardly be denied that there are forces 
 at work which tend to make the decent Raines Law hotel 
 the exception rather than the rule. 
 
 From time out of mind there have been inns and hotels 
 in which no attempt has been made to conform to the 
 rules of morality of the general community. The tran- 
 sient has always been of notoriously loose habits, and it 
 is only natural that vicious women should congregate 
 wherever he is entertained. Inn-keepers of unscrupulous 
 character have winked at disreputable practices where 
 they have not positively encouraged them and shared 
 the resulting profits. It is easy to understand the tran- 
 sition from such inns to the house of accommodation, 
 which does not derive any appreciable part of its returns 
 from legitimate service, but depends upon the patronage 
 brought to it by the professional street-walker. Wherever 
 
 159 
 
i6o 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 solicitation upon the street is permitted, such estab- 
 lishments will inevitably exist; and they will prosper or 
 decay with the form of vice which supports them. De- 
 pending entirely upon vice, their location is necessarily 
 limited to the quarters where the volume of vice is con- 
 siderable. Solicitation upon the street is in turn limited 
 to the vicinity of such houses, since the street-walker, in 
 order to ply her vocation with profit, must have a place 
 in the near vicinity to which she may bring her customers 
 or victims. There is, accordingly, a natural tendency 
 for vice to segregate itself, to a certain extent, from the 
 general community, to form notorious districts in the 
 various quarters of the large city. 
 
 New York, however, presents the unique feature of 
 providing virtual houses of accommodation throughout 
 the city, quite without regard for the actual demand for 
 them. As a consequence, all difficulties that normally 
 lie in the way of soliciting in other than notorious parts 
 of the city are removed. The street-walker may make 
 any place she chooses the scene of her operations. As 
 a result, solicitation is probably more general in New 
 York than in any other American city. 
 
 This abnormal and pernicious state of affairs is easily 
 explained by reference to the local excise laws. By 
 section 31 of the Raines Law the hotel is given a highly 
 favored position in the sale of alcoholic liquors, since it 
 alone is permitted to sell such liquors on Sunday. It is 
 a trite statement that the profits of a New York saloon 
 are made on Sunday, the week-day trade merely sufficing 
 to pay expenses. While this may be an exaggeration, 
 the Sunday trade is certainly important, since the reten- 
 tion of regular custom frequently depends upon it. It 
 was therefore inevitable that a great number of saloons 
 
Appendix 
 
 i6i 
 
 should attempt to annex a sufficient number of rooms to 
 pass under the definition of hotels. 
 
 For respectable purposes, however, the demand for 
 rooms connected with saloons is necessarily very limited. 
 And so the tenant of a “ hotel ” of this class has had the 
 choice between paying rent for vacant space or permit- 
 ting the use of his rooms for dishonorable purposes. Of 
 course there are many men in the liquor business who 
 have preferred a pecuniary loss to a shameful gain. But 
 it is easy to see why, in a class of men who are held more 
 or less in disrepute and who are repeatedly charged with 
 making a gain out of other men’s degradation, many will 
 be found who will not stick at profits, however stained. 
 It may be truthfully said that, under the most favorable 
 circumstances, the more scrupulous among the dealers 
 in alcoholic beverages are at a disadvantage. Under the 
 Raines Law, as it has been applied, there is an active 
 influence which favors those who do not hesitate to make 
 themselves the abettors of vice. 
 
 Anyone who is familiar with conditions in New York 
 must admit that the effect of the Raines Law has been 
 to provide unexampled accommodations for prostitution. 
 The only questions that are open to discussion are 
 whether the volume of vice is greater than it would be 
 if the Raines Law hotel did not exist, and whether vice 
 as it manifests itself in such institutions is more danger- 
 ous to public order and public health than it would be 
 under normal conditions. 
 
 The patronage of vice may be divided into two parts: 
 that which is given without the employment of any 
 allurements on the part of those who provide vicious 
 pleasures, and that which is procured by such allure- 
 ments. It is manifest that nothing can be done to limit 
 
i 62 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 the patronage of the first class. It is by the influence 
 upon the second class that the evil imputable to any in- 
 stitution must be estimated. 
 
 Nothing can be clearer than the fact that the possi- 
 bility, due to the Raines Law hotels, of soliciting now in 
 one part of the city, now in another, increases immensely 
 the number of persons whom the prostitute can subject 
 to her allurements. Moreover, so long as solicitation is 
 confined to comparatively limited areas, it is possible for 
 police agents to restrain, to a certain extent, the conduct 
 of vicious women. When solicitation may occur in any 
 part of the city, the task is made immeasurably greater. 
 Accordingly, the power for evil of the prostitute is in- 
 creased not only by the possibility given her of meeting 
 greater numbers of men, but also by the greater freedom 
 with which indecent proposals may be made. 
 
 More serious still, many of the Raines Law hotels are 
 themselves the scene of most insidious and therefore 
 most effective solicitation. The average citizen goes 
 there to drink his glass of beer and to listen to the bad 
 music and worse jokes that play so important a part in 
 summer entertainment. When there, he becomes sub- 
 ject to solicitation which has the appearance of a mere 
 flirtation; if he yields, it is with the least possible shock 
 to his moral sensibilities; he may feel that he did not 
 seek vice, but was overcome by circumstances. The 
 convenient arrangement of rooms makes exposure un- 
 likely. Persons who would hesitate to enter a brothel 
 or notorious rendezvous are easily “ victimized ” in the 
 Raines Law hotel with summer garden or roof garden or 
 other facilities for public entertainment. The uncom- 
 promising moralist will probably say that it is a matter 
 of small importance what befalls such moral imbeciles. 
 
Appendix 
 
 163 
 
 He might, however, change his opinion if he knew how 
 many of them there are. 
 
 Most serious of all, however, is the fact that the Raines 
 Law hotel which stands on the line between vice and 
 harmlessness is very frequently the place where the 
 growing boy is introduced to the mysteries of immoral- 
 ity. Where popular entertainment is given, it is inevi- 
 table that a certain number of immoral persons will be 
 found; and if accommodations for vice are present, the 
 work of recruiting the patronage of vice among boys 
 will certainly be active. 
 
 The effect of such institutions as the Raines Law 
 hotel in increasing the number of those who earn their 
 living by immorality is no less obvious. Without them, 
 the clandestine prostitute would necessarily take her 
 patrons to brothels, houses of assignation, or to her own 
 apartments. In any case, the risk of discovery would be 
 greater than at present. Many who are just starting 
 upon the downward path would shrink from entering 
 notorious haunts of vice. For such, the Raines Law 
 hotel is naturally convenient. Just as the establish- 
 ments which furnish free entertainment assist in the 
 downfall of the young man, so they familiarize the 
 young girl with the presence of disreputable characters 
 and permit her to admire their stylish dress and flashy 
 jewelry. 
 
 The most damning charge of all, however, is that the 
 Raines Law hotel provides the greatest known facilities 
 for seduction. Young girls, brought by unscrupulous 
 escorts to enjoy the entertainment given, are regaled on 
 beverages of the influence of which they are ignorant, 
 and, by the aid and assistance of the hotel provision, 
 fall easy victims. That this is no imaginary evil, nor 
 
164 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 one which is rare, is known to anyone in New York who 
 has eyes to see and ears to hear. 
 
 From the point of view of public order, the Raines 
 Law hotel is unquestionably pernicious. It is impossible 
 to form any idea of the number of thefts and robberies 
 committed by prostitutes and their male retainers, since 
 the victims do not usually make complaint. It is known, 
 however, that such crimes are constantly taking place. 
 They are naturally comparatively infrequent in the 
 brothel and in the apartments of the isolated prostitute: 
 in the former, because the proprietor of the establish- 
 ment does not care to have the reputation for violence; 
 in the latter, because the isolated prostitute does not wish 
 her real character to be known to her neighbors. Even 
 the house of accommodation is generally anxious to have 
 a reputation for safety. But the criminal prostitute can 
 take one client after another to a Raines Law hotel and 
 plunder him with the aid of her male retainer; and if 
 one were to make complaint, it is a simple matter for 
 the woman to choose another quarter for her crimes. 
 
 In like manner, the brothel and the isolated prostitute 
 with fixed station are anxious to avoid the reputation for 
 disease. To the one who uses a score of Raines Law 
 hotels indifferently, it makes no difference how many 
 persons she contaminates. Accordingly, there seems to 
 be good reason for the opinion, prevalent among New 
 York physicians, that the Raines Law hotels are the 
 chief factor in the spread of venereal disease. 
 
 It has been said that the evils above enumerated are 
 due not to the Raines Law, but to the manner in which 
 it is enforced. Probably not ten per cent, of the 
 “fake” hotels comply with the regulations of the fire, 
 health and building departments. Accordingly, ninety 
 
Appendix 
 
 165 
 
 per cent, could be wiped out of existence by simply en- 
 forcing the law. But would that end the matter ? 
 Hardly. Instead of going out of existence, the owners 
 of such establishments would be slightly more careful as 
 to the fulfilment of the requirements of those departments. 
 At a somewhat greater expense, they would still be “ ho- 
 tels,” and would still furnish accommodations for vice. 
 
 It is true that among the provisions of the law, the 
 proprietor or tenant is required to prevent the premises 
 from becoming “disorderly.” If this provision were 
 rigidly enforced, some of the evils could no doubt be 
 reached. But when a hundred provisions of a law may 
 be violated with impunity, there is little chance of en- 
 forcing any one. 
 
 Moreover, those who are best acquainted with New 
 York City are agreed that there is no chance that the law 
 will ever be enforced. The popular detestation of it 
 precludes all possibility of enforcement. 
 
 So far as the problem of prostitution is concerned, the 
 essential thing is to put an end to the abnormal tendency 
 to make hotels out of saloons. And this can be done 
 only by relieving the saloon proper of the disadvantages 
 under which it now labors, or of imposing an additional 
 burden upon the hotel. The latter policy would fall 
 under the same popular detestation with the Raines Law 
 itself, and so would seem to be out of the question. 
 Accordingly, the only alternative which appears to be 
 open is the removal of the restriction upon the selling of 
 alcoholic beverages on Sunday. It is not claimed that 
 even such a measure would remove all the evils that the 
 Raines Law, as it has been applied, has created. It 
 would, however, prevent the further growth of the evil 
 and would assist in making possible an effective moral 
 control of vice. 
 
The Social Evil 
 
 1 66 
 
 Note. — Provisions of Raines Law discriminating be- 
 tween the hotel and other establishments for retailing liquor 
 to be drunk on the premises. Definition of “ Hotel ” and 
 “ Guest.” Raines Law., § 31 : 
 
 “ It shall not be lawful for any corporation, associa- 
 tion, copartnership or person, whether having paid such 
 tax or not, to sell, offer or expose for sale, or give away, 
 any liquor : 
 
 “ a. On Sunday ; or before five o’clock in the morning 
 on Monday ; or 
 
 “b. On any other day between one o’clock and five 
 o’clock in the morning ; or 
 
 “ c. On the day of a general or special election, or 
 city election or town meeting, or village election, within 
 one-quarter of a mile of any voting place, while the polls 
 for such election or town meeting shall be open ; or 
 
 “ d. Within two hundred yards of the grounds or 
 premises upon which any state, county, town or other 
 agricultural or horticultural fair is being held, unless 
 such grounds or premises are within the limits of a city 
 containing one hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants 
 or more ; . . . 
 
 “ Clauses ‘a,’ ‘ c ’ and ‘ d ’ of this section are subject 
 to the following exception : 
 
 “ The holder of a liquor tax certificate under subdi- 
 vision one of section eleven of this act who is the keeper 
 of a hotel, may sell liquor to the guests of such hotel, 
 . , . with their meals, or in their rooms therein, except 
 
 between the hours of one o’clock and five o’clock in the 
 morning, but not in the barroom or other similar room 
 of such hotel ; and the term ‘ hotel ’ as used in this act 
 shall mean a building regularly used and kept open as 
 
Appendix 
 
 167 
 
 such for the feeding and lodging of guests, where all who 
 conduct themselves properly and who are able and ready 
 to pay for their entertainment, are received if there be 
 accommodations for them, and who, without any stipu- 
 lated engagement as to the duration of their stay, or as 
 to the rate of compensation, are, while there, supplied, 
 at a reasonable charge, with their meals, lodgings, re- 
 freshment and such service and attention as are neces- 
 sarily incident to the use of the place as a temporary 
 home, and in which the only other dwellers shall be the 
 family and servants of the hotel keeper ; and which 
 shall conform to the following requirements, if situate in 
 a city, incorporated village of twelve hundred or more 
 inhabitants, or within two miles of the corporate limits 
 of either : 
 
 “ I. The laws, ordinances, rules and regulations relating 
 to hotels and hotel keepers, including all laws, ordi- 
 nances, rules and regulations of the state or locality 
 pertaining to the building, fire and health department 
 in relation to hotels and hotel keepers, shall be fully 
 complied with. 
 
 “ 2. Such buildings shall contain at least ten bedrooms 
 above the basement, exclusive of those occupied by the 
 family and servants, each room properly furnished to 
 accommodate lodgers, and separated by partitions at 
 least three inches thick, extending from floor to ceiling, 
 with independent access to each room by a door opening 
 into a hallway, each room having a window or windows 
 with not less than eight square feet of surface opening 
 upon a street or open court, light-shaft or open air, and 
 each having at least eighty square feet of floor area, and 
 at least six hundred cubic feet of space therein ; a 
 dining-room with at least three hundred square feet of 
 
The Social Evil 
 
 1 68 
 
 floor area, which shall not be a part of the barroom, 
 with tables, and having suitable table furniture and ac- 
 commodations for at least twenty guests therein at one 
 and the same time, and a kitchen and conveniences for 
 cooking therein sufficient to provide bona fide meals at 
 one and the same time for twenty guests. . . . 
 
 “ A guest of a hotel, within the meaning of this excep- 
 tion to section thirty-one of this act, is : 
 
 “ I. A person who in good faith occupies a room in a 
 hotel as a temporary home, and pays the regular cus- 
 tomary charges for such occupancy, but who does not 
 occupy such room for the purpose of having liquor 
 served therein ; or 
 
 “ 2. A person who, during the hours when meals are 
 regularly served therein, resorts to the hotel for the pur- 
 pose of obtaining and actually orders and obtains at 
 such time, in good faith, a meal therein.” 
 
PART II. 
 

RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE COM- 
 MITTEE 
 
 A CAREFUL consideration of the foregoing 
 report points unmistakably to the conclusion 
 that the so-called system of regulation is not 
 a radical or adequate remedy for the evils con- 
 nected with prostitution, even in their merely 
 physical aspect. For the members of this 
 Committee, indeed, the moral grounds alone 
 would have sufficed to stamp as intolerable 
 the proposition that the public authorities 
 should undertake the inspection of houses of 
 ill-fame with a view to rendering the practice 
 of vice innocuous to those who engage in it. 
 We recommend to those persons who are 
 wont to extol this system as a kind of panacea 
 and to deplore, with something of impatience 
 if not of contempt, the Puritanical sentiment 
 which prevails in this country, and which ren- 
 ders any attempt to introduce such a system 
 impracticable, an attentive study of the pas- 
 sages in the above report relating to regu- 
 lation and its results. They will find, on a 
 
172 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 closer study of the results, as these appear 
 where the system has been tried, that their 
 vaunted panacea is no panacea at all, and that 
 their confidence in its merits is far from being 
 supported by the facts. 
 
 But, if not regulation, what then ? The 
 city of New York is rapidly expanding into 
 metropolitan proportions. Within another ten 
 years its aspect will, in many ways, be trans- 
 formed. It is certain to become a more com- 
 modious and beautiful city than it has ever 
 been before. But what will this material splen- 
 dor avail if the forces that tend to debase the 
 moral life of its people — and especially of its 
 youth — are permitted to operate unchecked ? 
 The Social Evil is assuming alarming dimen- 
 sions. What is needed at this time is a definite 
 policy with regard to it ; a policy that shall not 
 attempt the impossible, that shall not be based 
 on the delusive hope of radically altering in a 
 single generation the evil propensities of the 
 human heart, or of repressing vice by mere re- 
 strictive legislation, but which, none the less, 
 shall ever recognize as an ultimate end the 
 moral redemption of the human race from this 
 degrading evil, and which shall initiate no 
 measure and advise no step not conducive to 
 
Recommendations of the Committee 173 
 
 that end ; a policy that shall be practical with 
 respect to the immediate future, and shall at 
 the same time be in harmony with the ideals 
 which are cherished by the best men and 
 women in this community. 
 
 As an outline of such a policy, we submit 
 the following ; 
 
 First, strenuous efforts to prevent in the 
 tenement houses the overcrowding which is 
 the prolific source of sexual immorality. The 
 attempts to provide better housing for the 
 poor, praiseworthy and deserving of recog- 
 nition as they are, have as yet produced but a 
 feeble impression upon existing conditions, 
 and are but the bare beginnings of a work 
 which should be enlarged and continued with 
 unflagging vigor and devotion. If we wish to 
 abate the Social Evil, we must attack it at its 
 sources. 
 
 Secondly, the furnishing, by public pro- 
 vision or private munificence, of purer and 
 more elevating forms of amusement to sup- 
 plant the attractions of the low dance-halls, 
 theatres, and other similar places of entertain- 
 ment that only serve to stimulate sensuality 
 and to debase the taste. The pleasures of the 
 people need to be looked after far more earn- 
 
174 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 estly than has been the case hitherto. If we 
 would banish the kind of amusements that de- 
 grade, we must offer to the public in this large 
 cosmopolitan city, where the appetite for pleas- 
 ure is keen, some sort of suitable alternatives. 
 ^ Thirdly, whatever can be done to improve the 
 material conditions of the wage-earning class, 
 and especially of young wage-earning women, 
 will be directly in line with the purpose which 
 is here kept in view. It is a sad and humili- 
 ating admission to make, at the opening of the 
 twentieth century, in one of the greatest cen- 
 tres of civilization in the world, that, in nu- 
 merous instances, it is not passion or corrupt 
 inclination, but the force of actual physical 
 want, that impels young women along the road 
 to ruin. 
 
 The three suggestions mentioned above in- 
 dicate permanent causes to which the increase 
 of the Social Evil may be traced. A better 
 / system of moral education may also be men- 
 tioned as an imperative necessity in this con- 
 nection. As Dr. Prince A. Morrow, in a paper 
 on “The Prophylaxis of Venereal Diseases,” 
 says : 
 
 “ This campaign of education should be extended to 
 the high schools and colleges for young men. Unfor- 
 
Recommendations of the Committee 175 
 
 tunately, this has always been a forbidden topic. There 
 is no reason why young men should not be forewarned 
 of the pitfalls and dangers which beset their pathway. 
 Whatever may be thought of the innocuity of ‘ sowing 
 wild oats,’ its consequences are most often disastrous 
 to the health of the individual. They should also be 
 taught that self-restraint, personal purity, and respect 
 for women are among the surest foundations of char- 
 acter.” 
 
 But to come to the points that more directly 
 bear upon the problem as it presents itself in 
 the city of New York. 
 
 From a recent report of a committee of the 
 County Medical Association, it appears that 
 the great city of New York provides for the 
 reception and treatment of women suffering 
 from venereal diseases only twenty-six beds 
 in the City Hospital on Blackwell’s Island. 
 We recommend the adequate increase of 
 hospital accommodations for this class of 
 patients. This recommendation is based on 
 grounds of public health as well as of human- 
 ity to the sufferers. The public health is en- 
 dangered, in so far as contagion is allowed to 
 spread uncontrolled, and surely the sufferers 
 themselves are entitled to the mercy of their 
 fellow-beings. To justify the exclusion of such 
 patients from the hospitals, and in answer to 
 
176 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 the question, What then shall become of 
 them ? it has been said : “ Let them rot in their 
 own vices.” But this is a hard saying, all the 
 more when it is remembered that not a few of 
 the sufferers are but the victims of the sins of 
 others, bearing in their shattered constitutions 
 and in the loathsome disease inflicted upon 
 them the penalty of suffering and humiliation 
 which they themselves have done nothing to 
 deserve. 
 
 The Committee further recommend that 
 minors who are notoriously debauched shall 
 )e coercively confined in asylums or reforma- 
 tories. The minors who are engaged in pros- 
 titution constitute at once the most dangerous 
 and the most pitiable element in the problem 
 of the Social Evil. They are the most active 
 sources of contagion in every sense. In their 
 case the prospect is, at the same time, most 
 hopeful of waging effective warfare on the 
 Social Evil, since they are young enough, if 
 brought under the right influence, to be res- 
 cued from the army of the vicious and restored 
 to honest callings. 
 
 ^ But, above all, the Committee recommend 
 change in the attitude of the law. As it 
 ' stands at present, the law regards prostitu- 
 
Recommendations of the Committee 177 
 
 tion as a crime. If we are ever to escape from 
 the present impossible conditions, it seems im- 
 perative to draw the distinction sharply between 
 sin and crime. The proposition is to exclude 
 prostitution from the category of crime. We 
 hasten to add that this proposition should by 
 no means be understood as a plea in favor of 
 laxer moral judgments. A sin is not less 
 odious because it is not treated as a crime. 
 Sins may even be incomparably more heinous 
 than offences which the law visits with pun- 
 ishment. Nevertheless, some of the most 
 grievous sins are not subjected to legal penal- 
 ties, simply because it is recognized that such 
 penalties cannot be enforced, and a law on-, the 
 statute book that cannot be enforced is a 
 whip in the hands of the blackmailer. Cor- 
 ruption in the police force can never be extir- 
 pated until this prolific source of it is stopped. 
 
 But it may be asked : What, then, is to be the 
 status of prostitution in the city of New York? 
 In th e first place, i t must be driven out of tene- 
 ment and apartment houses ; the evil must be 
 rigidly excluded from the homes of the poor. 
 Secondly, it must not be segregated in 
 separate quarters of the city, for the reason 
 that such quarters tend to become nests of 
 
178 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 crime and veritable plague spots, and for the 
 further reason that segregation does not segre- 
 gate, just as it has been shown that regula- 
 tion does not regulate. JThirdl^, all public, 
 obtrusive manifestations of prostitution shall 
 be sternly repressed. Not prostitution itself, 
 when withdrawn from the public eye so as to 
 be noticeable only to those who deliberately 
 go in search of it, shall be punishable ; but all 
 such manifestations of it as belong under the 
 head of public nuisance. The result of the 
 adoption of this policy will be, indeed, the 
 continued existence of houses of ill-fame, partly 
 in streets formerly residential and deserted by 
 the better class of occupants, partly scattered 
 in the neighborhood of the great thorough- 
 fares and elsewhere, and these will remain un- 
 disturbed under the condition that they remain 
 unobtrusive. The serious and weighty objec- 
 tions that lie against the existence of such 
 houses are well known. But they are in every 
 case objections which really apply to the ex- 
 istence of prostitution itself. They could only 
 be removed if prostitution itself could sum- 
 marily be extirpated. But this, in the present 
 state of the moral evolution of the race, is as 
 yet impossible. Recognizing, then, that pros- 
 
Recommendations of the Committee 179 
 
 titution, although it ought not to exist, does 
 and will for an indefinable time continue to 
 exist among us, we are bound, as men ad- 
 vising for the moral welfare of our great city 
 in the immediate future, to point out that 
 form of the evil which, all things considered, 
 will work the least harm. 
 
 The better housing for the poor, purer 
 forms of amusement, the raising of the condi- 
 tion of labor, especially of female labor, better 
 moral education, minors more and more with- 
 drawn from the clutches of vice by means of 
 reformatories, the spread of contagion checked 
 by more adequate hospital accommodations, 
 the evil itself unceasingly condemned by public 
 opinion as a sin against morality, and punished 
 as a crime with stringent penalties whenever 
 it takes the form of a public nuisance : — these 
 are the methods of dealing with it upon which 
 the members of the Committee have united 
 and from which they hope for the abatement 
 of some of the worst of its consequences at 
 present, and for the slow and gradual restric- 
 tion of its scope in the future. 
 
 In addition, we would recommend the crea- 
 tion of a special body of morals police, analo- 
 gous to the sanitary police already existing. 
 
i8o 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 selected on grounds of exceptional judg- 
 ment and fitness, to whom and to whom alone 
 should be entrusted the duties of surveillance 
 and repression contemplated in the above 
 recommendations. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 PRESENT CONDITIONS IN NEW YORK 
 
 Trading in vice has had a rapid develop- 
 ment in New York City within the last few 
 years. A combination of circumstances has 
 made this possible. Through the Raines Law, 
 the entrance upon a life of prostitution be- 
 came attractive and easy. The appearance of 
 the “cadet” formed the connecting link be- 
 tween the Raines Law hotel and the house of 
 prostitution. The partnership between some 
 of the officials of the Police Department and 
 the traffickers of prostitution resulted in a sys- 
 tem of reciprocity. Immunity from arrest was 
 exchanged for profits from the trade in vice. 
 When a house containing not more than ten 
 inmates, exclusive of the proprietress, and 
 known as a “ fifty-cent house,” could afford to 
 pay an initiation fee of $500. to the wardman, 
 and $50. a month for the privilege of continu- 
 ing in this illegal occupation unmolested, an 
 
 i8r 
 
i 82 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 estimate can be formed as to the amount of 
 trade which must be carried on within. 
 
 In one police precinct, not more than a mile 
 square, there were known to be in 1900 about 
 forty such houses. In the same precinct there 
 were some sixty well-known centres of prosti- 
 tution in tenement houses. The employees of 
 these houses openly cried their wares upon the 
 streets, and children of the neighborhood were 
 given pennies and candy to distribute the cards 
 of the prostitutes. A system of “ watch boys ” 
 or “light-houses” was also adopted, by which 
 the news of any impending danger could be 
 carried throughout a precinct in a very few 
 minutes. Honest police officers who attempted 
 to perform their duties were defied by the 
 “cadets” and “light-houses.” For a police 
 officer to incur the enmity of a powerful 
 “ madame ” meant the transfer of that officer 
 “ for the good of the service,” if not to another 
 precinct, at least to an undesirable post in the 
 same precinct. A virtual reign of terror ex- 
 isted among the honest patrolmen and the 
 ignorant citizens of these districts. Many 
 times, citizens from such quarters have said 
 that they would gladly tell what they could not 
 help but see, were it not that they feared bodily 
 
Appendix 
 
 183 
 
 harm and the destruction of their means of 
 livelihood if they spoke. Little by little the 
 facts were placed on record in the trials of 
 police officers and “ cadets.” 
 
 The Cadet and His Victim. — The “ cadet ” 
 is a young man, averaging from eighteen to 
 twenty-five years of age, who, after having 
 served a short apprenticeship as a “ light- 
 house,” secures a staff of girls and lives 
 upon their earnings. He dresses better than 
 the ordinary neighborhood boy, wears an 
 abundance of cheap jewelry, and has usually 
 cultivated a limited amount of gentlemanly 
 demeanor. His occ ^ation is professional 
 seduction. By occasional visits he succeeds in 
 securing the friendship of some attractive shop- 
 girl. By apparently kind and generous treat- 
 ment, and by giving the young girl glimpses 
 of a standard of living which she had never 
 dared hope to attain, this friendship rapidly 
 ripens into infatuation. The Raines Law 
 hotel or the “ furnished-room hous^"^ith its 
 cafe on the ground floor, is soon visited for 
 refreshments. After a drugged drink, the girl 
 wakens and finds herself at the mercy of her 
 supposed friend. Through fear and promises 
 of marriage she casts her fortunes with her 
 
184 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 companion, and goes to live with him. The 
 companion disappears ; and the shop-girl finds 
 herself an inmate of a house of prostitution. 
 She is forced to receive visitors of the house. 
 For each visitor the girl receives a brass or 
 pasteboard check from the cashier of the house 
 entitling her to twenty-five cents. The “ cadet ” 
 returns to the house at frequent intervals, 
 takes the checks from his victim, and cashes 
 them at the cashier’s desk. 
 
 Within the last year, six “ cadets ” have been 
 sent to State prison for abducting girls under 
 the age of eighteen years. The facts were 
 substantially similar in all the cases, and in a 
 majority of them the victims were physical 
 wrecks when rescued. 
 
 The victim of the “ cadet ” is usually a young 
 girl of foreign birth who knows little or nothing 
 of the conditions of American life. She has 
 just reached womanhood, and is taught by her 
 parents that the time has come for her to look 
 forward to marriage. Very often, the parents 
 themselves are highly flattered by the atten- 
 tions which are being paid to their daughter 
 by such a prosperous-appearing young man. 
 The conditions are all favorable for the ac- 
 complishment of the purpose for which the 
 
Appendix 
 
 185 
 
 cadet ” began his attentions. The early teach- 
 ings of the young girl are propitious for the 
 consummation of her destruction. She is 
 taught that obedience should be unquestioned, 
 and that the word of the husband in the house- 
 hold is law. The “ cadet ” relentlessly uses 
 these weapons which have been placed in his 
 hands, and he soon finds himself in possession 
 of this money-maker whose receipts will yield 
 him ordinarily forty or fifty dollars a week. If 
 the young girl succeeds in escaping from the 
 house of prostitution, she prefers, in a majority 
 of cases, to become a street-walker rather than 
 to return home and to face the disgrace which 
 awaits her there. 
 
 Conditions in Tenement Houses . — The reve- 
 nue-producing power of the sale of immunity 
 by the police seemed to make the appetite of 
 the police insatiable. The infamy of the private 
 house, with all the horrors arising from the 
 “ cadet ” system, did not satisfy official greed. 
 The tenement houses were levied upon, and 
 the prostitutes began to ply their trade therein 
 openly. In many of these tenement houses as 
 many as fifty children resided. An acquaint- 
 ance by the children with adult vices was in- 
 evitable. Almost any child on the East Side 
 
i86 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 in New York will tell you what a “ nafke bias ” 
 is. The children of the tenements eagerly 
 watch the new sights in their midst. The sta- 
 tistics of venereal diseases among children and 
 the many revolting stories from the Red Light 
 district tell how completely they learned the 
 lessons taught them. 
 
 In the argument before the Cities Com- 
 mittee at Albany in April, 1901, the Chairman 
 of the Committee of Fifteen presented certain 
 statistics founded upon an inspection of 125 
 tenement houses in which prostitutes were 
 known to reside and to ply their trade. This 
 statement gave rise to violent attempts at 
 refutation by prominent officials both at 
 Albany and in New York City. An attempt 
 was made to becloud the issue by statements of 
 these officials that the virtue of the poor had 
 been assailed by the Committee of Fifteen. 
 Our then Police Commissioner, whose igno- 
 rance of conditions would have been humorous 
 rather than pathetic were not the facts so seri- 
 ous, stated that there was not a disorderly 
 tenement-house below Fourteenth Street ; that 
 he had lived in that neighborhood for many 
 years and knew what he was talking about. In 
 spite of his vigorous denial, complaints were 
 
Appendix 
 
 187 
 
 received by the Committee of Fifteen and evi- 
 dence was easily collected against prostitutes 
 in the street in which he himself resided. 
 
 In the work of the Committee of Fifteen, 
 evidence was secured in over three hundred ^ 
 separate disorderly apartments in tenement 
 houses in the city of New York. Over two 
 hundred of these tenants were removed under 
 the new Tenement House Law which went 
 into effect July ist, 1901. Authentic reports 
 reached the Committee that many of the tene- 
 ment-house prostitutes were retiring into pri- 
 vate houses of prostitution. 
 
 It is certain that the houses of prostitution 
 are not flaunting their wares upon the streets 
 in the manner of a year ago. Street-walking 
 is also far less frequent. A number of the 
 more notorious dives have either changed 
 hands or have closed their doors. The most 
 widely known proprietor of houses of prosti- 
 tution in New York City is now serving a 
 term in prison upon evidence secured by the 
 
 * It is impossible with such a limited staff of workers as were em- 
 ployed by the Committee of Fifteen to approximate the number of 
 prostitutes or houses of prostitution in New York City. The figures 
 given represent cases where corroborated evidence was secured by 
 the Committee. There are no trustworthy statistics in existence 
 covering the general question of the Social Evil in New York. 
 
i88 
 
 The Social Evil 
 
 Committee of Fifteen. The proprietor of sev- 
 eral of the lowest dives is at the present time 
 a fugitive from justice, having forfeited his bail. 
 Three police cfficers who were shown to have 
 been in partnership with vice have already been 
 convicted, and a half dozen are now awaiting 
 trial. As a result of the whole movement, the 
 prospect for a reasonable control of the Social 
 Evil in New York City is more favorable at 
 the present time than it has been for many 
 years. 
 

 
# 
 
AT- 
 
 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 D01138886Z