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 FOUNDED BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER 
 
 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE 
 DELINQUENTS 
 
 A DISSERTATION 
 
 SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE DIVINITY 
 
 SCHOOL IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF 
 
 DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY 
 
 BY 
 RICHARD ROY PERKINS 
 
 H 
 
 ROCKFORD 
 of 01. Jff. 
 1906 
 
t t 
 
 f 
 
 COPYRIGHT 1906 BY 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO 
 
PREFACE 
 
 Out of a situation betraying the stage of experiment, attentive 
 to the cry of a world of neglected children, encouraged by the 
 spectacle of the earnest army of volunteer servants of the unfor- 
 tunate, these thoughts have grown. With the many factors to 
 take account of, time no less than thought and action is necessary 
 for the working out of juvenile salvation. Therefore, one must be 
 content not to draw up a final program, but rather to reconnoitre. 
 
 But the careful and successful scout always knows the retro- 
 spect of the land as well as he does the prospect. Yesterday's ex- 
 perience with delinquent childhood has been written in such bits 
 that it has been difficult to read it as a continuous arc, enlighten- 
 ing us as to the exact path trodden and yet to be followed. It is 
 yesterday's path we tread, but never before with such eagerness 
 and progress, nor with such impatience toward injustice and undue 
 conservatism, nor again, with such disposition to unite forces. 
 We begin to relate civic righteousness, moral uprightness in busi- 
 ness, public health and culture, with the community's childhood 
 and its environment, and the campaign is launched. To take a 
 small part in it would be worth while. 
 
 R. R. P. 
 
 January, 1906. 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION - - - - - *.- . - -9 
 
 PART I. THE JUVENILE DELINQUENT IN THE AB- 
 SENCE OF SPECIAL LEGISLATION 
 
 CHAPTER II. THE CHILD IN ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS - * - - 13 
 
 1. Introduction .---13 
 
 2. The Child as a Member of the Family - - - - - - 13 
 
 3. The Child as a Member of the State - - 16 
 CHAPTER III. THE CHILD AMONG PRIMITIVE PEOPLES - 18 
 
 PART II. THE DEVELOPMENT OF SPECIAL LEGIS- 
 LATION FOR THE JUVENILE DELINQUENT 
 
 CHAPTER IV. EARLY AND INCIDENTAL LEGISLATION - - - - 23 
 
 CHAPTER V. SPECIAL LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS STATES - - - 25 
 
 1. England 25 
 
 2. France ------------ 27 
 
 3. Germany 27 
 
 4. United States - - - 28 
 
 5. Conclusion 32 
 
 PART III. THE APPARATUS FOR THE TREATMENT 
 OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. THE JUVENILE COURT 37 
 
 r ^ Origin - - 37 
 
 2. The Judge 37 
 
 3. The Jury 38 
 
 4. Legal Representative for the Child 38 
 
 5. Procedure 38 
 
 6. Place of Detention 39 
 
 7. Juvenile Courts and Parents - 40 
 
 8. The Court and Private Interest 41 
 
 CHAPTER VII. THE PROBATION SYSTEM 43 
 
 1. Origin --- . 43 
 
 2. Probation Officers 45 
 
 3. The School and Probation 46 
 
 4. The Church and Probation 46 
 
 5. The Home and Probation 47 
 
 6. Some Methods in the Probation System 47 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. CHILD-SAVING INSTITUTIONS AND THE JUVENILE 
 
 COURT. 50 
 
PART IV. CRITIQUE OF PRINCIPLES, MEANS AND 
 METHODS: SUMMARY. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 CHAPTER IX. PRINCIPLES DRAWN FROM EXPERIENCE 55 
 
 CHAPTER X. THE SPIRIT OF THE LAW AS A FACTOR IN THE TREAT- 
 MENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENCY 59 
 
 CHAPTER XI. THE FUNCTION OF THE COURT AND THE PROBATION 
 
 SYSTEM - 64 
 
 CHAPTER XII. WHERE THE JUVENILE DELINQUENT RANKS ARE 
 RECRUITED IN ST. LOUIS; SUGGESTIONS FROM A 
 
 PARTICULAR STUDY. 67 
 
 1 . The Recruiting of the Ranks 67 
 
 2. The Facts Ensemble in the Records $9 
 
 3. The Task of the Schools 71 
 
 a. Compulsory Education 7 1 
 
 b. Moral Training 71 
 
 c. Civic Instruction 7 2 
 
 d. Manual and Religious Training 73 
 
 4. Parks, Playgrounds, Vacation Schools and Settlements 73 
 
 5. The Place of the Library and the Librarian 73 
 
 6. Civic Improvement Leagues 74 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. CONCLUSION --------- 76 
 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 The early sculptor carved a child, and he carved a man in mini- 
 ature, with muscular limbs and body and small head. The beauty 
 of the child physique fled before this caricature. The legal sculp- 
 tor has attempted to chisel a child who has broken the laws of the 
 group, and his model has been an adult criminal. And the moral 
 beauty of childhood has often taken a like course. To lose in the 
 statue the plumpness and the irresistible grace of childhood jars 
 our aesthetic sense, but the incomparably greater loss of really 
 injuring child life condemns us. Where we should have used a 
 magnifying glass on the child we have used a minifying glass on 
 the man and judged the result to be the same. Today we are re- 
 defining both crime and juvenile delinquency in the attempt to 
 remedy the error, and doing it to the advantage of both classes. 
 
 Every member of a community is considered delinquent or 1 
 faultless, his action licit or illicit according to his attitude towards 
 the accredited opinion of the group, usually expressed in its 
 written law. The aim of the group is to bring all into conformity 
 with its standard. Success depends upon many conditions, among 
 them educational advantages and the use made of them; eco- 
 nomic conditions in the group, immediacy of need, number of 
 providers, etc.; the corrective apparatus through which conformity 
 is enforced where necessary; religious beliefs and practices; the 
 constitution and character of the family; the size of the group and 
 its relations with other groups. 
 
 But there is one further condition which in our effort to promote 
 conformity to group standards we have come to consider impor- 
 tant, namely the age of the member of the group. The child can- 
 not well live up to the standard: he lives toward it. This has been 
 acknowledged in some manner in all early and primitive groups.,. 
 The child has usually remained subject only to the discipline of 
 the family, and the responsibility for his conformity has been on 
 the head of the family. Even when old enough to be accounted 
 responsible in some measure, or entirely so, often the penalties for 
 non-conformity have been mitigated or suspended. But neither 
 among such peoples nor among us has sufficient emphasis been 
 placed upon youth and upon consequent irresponsibility for actions 
 as factors in juvenile delinquency. As our life becomes more 
 complex, the problem of training the child into harmony with all/ 
 his associates grows to appalling proportions and new elements! 
 are added continually. Yet we may learn much from the past and 
 
10 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 its estimate of the child and his place in the group life, especially 
 in the family and before the law. It is a question of deepest con- 
 cern whether the present legal status of the child finds him follow- 
 ing the legal fortunes of his parents without reference to his age, 
 or whether in the story of the race and its child life there has 
 gradually developed a feeling that he is subject for special treat- 
 ment as a child, or again, whether the modern revolt against ident- 
 ifying him with the adult before the law is so entirely modern that 
 it is not yet to be trusted. We are seeking broad and safe prin- 
 ciples of procedure in regard to the treatment of children, and we 
 dare not neglect the experience of other peoples and ages any 
 more than we can afford to pass by the highly valuable data of 
 child psychology and pedagogy. Hence we are led into today 
 through a brief glimpse at yesterday. 
 
PART I 
 
 THE JUVENILE DELINQUENT IN THE ABSENCE 
 OF SPECIAL LEGISLATION 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 THE CHILD IN ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 
 
 /. Introduction. A child is born, and immediately faces a 
 jury the jury of the whole group. This body has its inevitable 
 standing instructions and on the basis of these it is to determine 
 the status of the child. ''What is his sex?" it asks. "What is 
 the family organization? Which parent shall control his early 
 life? Is he a legitimate child? Are both parents of the same 
 group and of the same religion? To what social class do they 
 belong? Is the child by virtue of birth a member of the group, or 
 only of the family? Which has final control of his fortunes?" 
 And instantly there is passed a verdict from which there is no 
 appeal. According to the instructions dictated by custom or writ- 
 ten law he is thus early assigned his place as a hanger-on, as an 
 alien within the group, as a citizen with rights today, or tomorrow 
 to be granted, as in line for class privileges or as simply a member 
 of the family with no claims or rights beyond. Among ancient 
 peoples this last was usually precisely the case. 
 
 In no way may we better appreciate the justice, the inevitable- 
 ness, the whole significance of the verdict of the modern group 
 upon the place of the child within it, than through a rapid survey 
 of the judgment passed upon the matter throughout the centuries. 
 To make such a survey inclusive of the detail of custom and legis- 
 lation would be as impossible as it would be useless for our 
 purpose. But we may with profit observe broad tendencies and 
 typical cases sufficiently to furnish us the sweep of the develop- 
 ment that we wish. Clearly there is such a development. Re- 
 valuation of child life and of its significance to the future of the 
 group is continually going on, with the child gradually but cer- 
 tainly emerging from the darkness of neglect into the light of a 
 vastly improved condition. Men had but to observe that as the, 
 twig inclined so the tree grew, and to observe the social disaster 
 following upon the growth of many gnarled and stunted and un- 
 healthy lives in order to know the importance of more careful 
 training and sane prevention. The knitting together of the mem- 
 bers of the group and the constantly increasing interdependence 
 of all members of the social body furnished a final impulse. 
 
 2. The Child as a Member of the Family. The early group 
 was a society, unified through kinship. The members were sub- 
 ject to the laws of the group, framed with a view to group advan- 
 tage. The primitive struggle for existence demanded that men 
 should "hang together lest they hang separately," and what was 
 
 13 
 
14 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 more natural than that there should develop a strong sense of 
 family unity, centering" in that member of the family who was the 
 most effective leader and provider? Thus into the hands of the 
 father, usually, the fortunes of the family drifted: he was respon- 
 sible, and he was powerful. 1 This seems a far more logical 
 explanation of the patria potestas, the paternal power over the for- 
 tunes of the children, than the attribution of it to the more special 
 influence of religion. To be sure, the father in many of the 
 earlier civilizations was formally the religious head of the family, 
 but we do not need to resort to this for the explanation of his 
 power over his family. 2 The fact exists that extraordinary 
 powers were centered in the father, and the education and 
 correction of the child were usually left to him rather than to the 
 group as a whole. The child was not a member of the latter and 
 neither owed the other anything, until such time as the "state" 
 feeling, based upon territory and property, became so strong that 
 a broader, more inclusive authority was sought. 
 
 The patria potestas is observed typically in early Rome, which is 
 the more remarkable in that it operated even on into the time 
 when the "state" idea was strong, and the great ambition of the 
 Roman youth was to be a "citizen." The power of the father 
 over his children was absolute. He might kill them if he would, 
 and there was no greater power to interfere. Such power con- 
 tinued ordinarily to the close of the father's life and included not 
 only his own children but also the children of his sons and those 
 of his sons' sons. 3 Of course, daughters after marriage came under 
 the patria potestas of another group. The son's position as a citizen 
 was not at all affected by his subjection to this despotic power: in 
 his public relations he was oil the level with his father. 4 This 
 involved peculiar relations at times. Yet this anomalous condition 
 of affairs serves better than anything else to set before us the 
 development of the matter. The unity of the family was still pro- 
 foundly felt, carrying along with it the rights and responsibilities 
 of its head, but the sense of the larger social relationships was 
 growing. The inevitable result was a modification of the patria 
 potestas. Legally the son had "had no remedy, either civil or crim- 
 inal, against his father for any act, forbearance or omission of any 
 kind whatever." 5 The father had had the right to twice sell his 
 son into slavery without the son having any claim of exemption 
 from paternal authority. 6 In the Empire the power of life and 
 death could be exercised only with the concurrence of the govern- 
 ment, and selling the child remained only as a form of certain legal 
 transactions. 7 Upon the rise and spread of Christianity after 
 
 1 L. H. Morgan, Ancient Society, pp. 465-6. 
 
 2 For a detailed expression of this suggestion, see Gaston Drucker, "De la Protection 
 de L,' Enfant centre L,es Abvs de la Puissance Paternelle" Premiere Partie. 
 
 3 James Hadley, "Introduction to Roman Law" p. 119. 4 Ib. p. 121. 
 
 5 W. E. Hearn, "The Aryan Household," p. 92. 
 
 6 Table IV. "Twelve Ta,hles," time of compilation, 451 B. C. See Lee, "Historical 
 Jurisprudence," p. 198. 
 
 7 Hadley, "Introd. to Roman Law," p. 123. 
 
THE CHILD IN ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 15 
 
 Constantine, there was a further decline in the patria potestas, till by 
 the time the Justinian Code was projected in 527, after some dec- 
 ades of codification by others, the laws of the family, property 
 and succession were altered and the patria potestas in its absolute 
 form finally disappeared. The state had given the child a right 
 to life and liberty he was a person. 8 The prophecy of this 
 is to be seen centuries back in the formality observed in admit- 
 ting the boy to citizenship in the state. After such a signif- 
 icant act became an institution, the patria potestas, as ever against 
 the state's interest in the child, must live by its own momentum. 
 In Roman Law alone there is thus most interesting evidence of 
 tremendous social change, and the earnest of our modern legisla- 
 tion assuming the parental function of the state. 
 
 What is typically observed in Rome existed in nearly all the 
 ancient civilizations. In Babylon the son stood to the father 
 much as a slave; the father hired him out and received payment 
 for his services, and exercised great powers over his person. 9 The 
 same was true in Israel, though Moses (10) limited the power 
 of life and death by making it necessary for the parent to lay the 
 accusation before the court of elders. 1 1 The patria potestas seems 
 to have been a fundamental principle of Aryan Society, outgrown 
 always at some time in favor of the "state" view of things, but 
 outgrown apparently almost accidentally, at widely different times 
 in various groups, with the immediate cause here one thing and 
 there another.' 
 
 In Egypt the child was protected through enlarged rights of 
 the mother, stated in the contract of marriage and enforceable by 
 law. The father could not disinherit or cast out the eldest son. 
 The patria potestas was here modified but hardly in favor of the 
 parens patria as we have it. 
 
 In India as late as Manu's "Institutes of Sacred Laws," which 
 are hardly later than the second or third century, A. D., a son 
 other than the eldest might be sold by his parents to be adopted 
 into another family. But evidently a keen moral sense against 
 this was organized there long before it was in other countries. 12 
 
 Athens early felt the need of adjustment between the rights of 
 the clan and the rights of the state in the child. Contemporary 
 with the recognition of the latter's rights was a curtailment of the 
 patria potestas, and this is plainly to be seen by Solon's time (638- 
 558). He deprived the father of rights which had always been con- 
 sidered inherent in fatherhood, treating father and son as indepen- 
 dent individuals whose respective claims were based upon the fulfill- 
 ment of their respective duties. 13 This was an inevitable con- 
 comitant of the rising community feeling. The son was a future 
 member of the community, and therefore the state had a right in 
 him, superior to that of his father. Being born a free citizen po- 
 
 8 Lee, "Historical Jurisprudence," pp. 306-7. 
 
 9 Lee, "Hist. Jurisprudence," p. 39. 
 
 10 Deut. XXI. iSff. ii See Ploss, "Das Kind," ii, 246. 
 
 12 Lee, "Hist. Jurisprudence," p. 132. 13 Lee, "Hist. Jurisprudence," p. 173. 
 
16 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 tentially, he could not be sold as a slave, nor disinherited with- 
 out just cause. It was a community interest that he be educated, 
 fitted to live, and the state pressed its point by maintaining that 
 unless he were so fitted he should be under no obligation to support 
 his father in his old age. 14 Up to 16, however, 'he was under the 
 control of his father. This was a transition time in the status of the 
 child and the regulations bear the stamp of it. Between 16 and 18 
 the state dictated a two years' course of training in the gymnasia, 
 and following this preliminary preparation for its service he was 
 formally admitted to full citizenship, swearing fealty to it and to its 
 religion, and receiving from it a shield and spear in token of his 
 acceptance. And it was the father of the family ordinarily who 
 presented him! 15 
 
 Among the Germanic tribes during the early Christian cen- 
 turies there does not seem to have been the same extraordinary 
 development of the power of the father over the child. The child 
 was soon needed in the group and attained majority early. The 
 family idea was strong, but in a militant group the need of the 
 group for the sons would naturally curb the absolute power of the 
 father. Yet among these peoples late into the Middle Ages the 
 father's right to sell the child is recognized, although its exercise 
 seems to have become obsolete. 16 
 
 The tendency thus far is clear; the social process is going on. 
 The community feeling becomes larger than that of the family, and 
 is based on common interest and protection rather than on kin- 
 ship. The child in his training antl correction belongs to the 
 larger group, and though the father may have full control of him 
 up to a certain age, or only nominally so long as he lives, yet in 
 the exercise of his parental functions he is looked upon as a 
 representative of the state. The laws of domestic relations, the laws 
 of property, and the criminal laws begin to reflect it, indeed had 
 done so in Solon's time. But that is another study. We may 
 observe briefly this same tendency where the state gained a sense 
 of its unity and responsibility over each member so early as to 
 furnish us a spectacle of the state acting as parent to an extent to 
 which we shall not approach so long as we hold our present views 
 on the superiority. of the family as a home for childhood and the 
 inadequacy of any other institution to do its work. 
 
 3. The Child as a Member of the State. In the preceding 
 paragraph it is suggested that the power of the father over the 
 child came to be exercised as a representative power for the state. 
 But nothing is so clear as that the patria potestas was ordinarily an 
 institution operating in the interests of the father only or at most of 
 the family. This is so true that it would be quite right to treat Sparta 
 as an exception rather than as another rule. Sparta was a military 
 camp during much of its comparatively brief existence, never em- 
 bracing more than two-fifths of the peninsula "hollow, lovely 
 
 14 Lee, "H/st. Jurisprudence," p. 173. 15 Hughs, "Ancient Civilization" I 608. 
 
 16 Hearn, "The Aryan Household," p. 93. 
 
THE CHILD IN ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS 17 
 
 Lacedaemon," as Homer wrote, shut in by the glorious mountains 
 to her own narrow, intense self. Why should she not turn herself 
 to the defense of her small world? and why should she not do her 
 task invincibly? Why, if every Spartan were to be a hero on the 
 battlefield, should not all interests be subordinated to those of the 
 state, and the child trained with her future in view? Thus it was 
 that the Spartan had to expose his feeble child on the hills for the 
 state's benefit. The healthy child was left with his mother only 
 until seven, then was placed in the common-school or gymnasium 
 and kept at the expense of the state. The parents "had no part 
 or voice in the education of their children, but assisted in' persuad- 
 ing them to undergo the trials and hardships without flinching or 
 whimpering." 17 Not only was the aim of the family and the 
 state entirely one in regard to the child, but the co-operation was 
 complete in training him. The modern state is Spartan in the 
 social value it gives the child, and without bearing the burden of 
 being essentially Spartan, is in many communities beginning to 
 insist on an analogous right to superintend the fitting of the child 
 for life in the group. ( Fortunately there exists the' fundamental 
 difference that now the task is mediated through the family where 
 the family proves itself to be adequate. It has been worth the 
 centuries it has required, to learn that it is not the child for the 
 social body or the family, but the child for the social body through 
 the family. The world preferred to stumble along laboriously into 
 a more promising and satisfactory solution which should preserve 
 its most sacred institution. Sparta was not followed because the 
 typical Spartan was iiot the typical man. Let the dreamer of to- 
 day who sets off the two institutions against each other take notice. 
 
 17 Hughs, "Ancient Civilization," 560. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 THE CHILD AMONG PRIMITIVE PEOPLES 
 
 It is plain, surely, that the status of the child depends very 
 largely on the standard the group sets for itself. That once well 
 formulated, the methods through which conformity to it is de- 
 manded will work themselves out. Penalties for non-conformity 
 and stimulations to conformity are in order. How the child stands 
 in the group is the question to be answered in each case, and the 
 ultimate aim is the determination of principles, based upon obser- 
 vation of both child and group principles that will effectively aid 
 us in preventing delinquency and promoting conformity in any 
 group whatever. 
 
 The nearer we are to primitive life the more delinquency is 
 couched in terms of failure to conform to a standard that is closely 
 and immediately utilitarian. The highest morality is effectiveness 
 in behalf of the tribe. To be a brave, uncowed man, a good 
 hunter and warrior is the aim. Therefore what is most detested 
 and condemned is cowardice or treachery, and a multitude of 
 things which in a more civilized community would be subjects of 
 legislation and not at all countenanced, are in a primitive group 
 passed by as thoroughly incidental. Often there is no punishment 
 for insolence, thievery, cheating or lying. The line of the great 
 good is nearer to the instincts, especially those of gaming, hunting 
 and fighting. 1 
 
 Thus, among the American Indians the notion has pretty gen- 
 erally existed that the boys, who were to be the warriors and pro- 
 viders of tomorrow, were to be permitted to do almost anything 
 which roused the warrior spirit, and were to be subjected to 
 nothing which served to dampen their ardor. The California 
 Indian child was never flogged, "as it was thought to. break his ' 
 spirit.' 7 2 The same has been observed in Mexico, (3) and of 
 the Arawaks of South America. Among the latter a parent "will" 
 bear any insult or inconvenience from his child tamely rather than 
 administer personal correction." 4 "He is very wicked" is the 
 greatest praise to be accorded a parent concerning a child among 
 the Dyaks of Borneo. 5 
 
 In many respects the power of the parent among primitive 
 peoples is absolute. It is the common report of travelers that 
 
 1 Ratzel, "Hist, of Mankind," vol. i, p. 441. 
 
 2 Bancroft, "Native Races of the Pacific States," i, 437. 
 
 3 Carl I,umholtz, "Unknown Mexico," 1902, vol. i, p. 247. 
 
 4 Hillhouse, J. R. G. S. ii. 229. 
 
 5 Roth, "The Natives of Sarawak and British North Borneo," 103. 
 
 18 
 
THE CHILD AMONG PRIMITIVE PEOPLES 19 
 
 infanticide is practised, (6) and that the sale of children is fre- 
 quent. 7' The status of the child is determined by the group's 
 manner of life, which is usually nomadic and on a war basis. 
 Therefore we expect that the children will be in early years left 
 largely with the women, to be instructed in the traditions of the 
 tribe, in elementary woodcraft and in all the matters which are 
 regarded as the special interest and function of that sex. 8 With 
 the distinction between the sexes usually observed among primitive 
 peoples we cannot but look for a time in the life of the boy when 
 he shall leave one group for the other a time of great consequence 
 to him and marked by ceremonies of initiation to manhood. 9, 10 
 It is not to be supposed that during early childhood the child had 
 no communication of an intimate sort with the men of the tribe, 
 nor that he received no instruction from his father or paternal 
 relatives. The fact of his future vocation as a warrior and hunter 
 guaranteed such oversight. But normally there was a definite time 
 of transfer from maternal or family control to tribal membership 
 and citizenship, just as there was among the Romans. "Every 
 Australian native," say Spencer and Gillen, "so far as is known, 
 has in the normal condition of the tribe to pass through certain 
 ceremonies of initiation before he is admitted to the secrets of the 
 tribe and is regarded as a fully developed member of it." 11 Then 
 the absolute character of parental authority disappears; often the 
 child is completely independent of the family and is subject only 
 to tribal discipline. 12 
 
 It is evident that throughout the child's early life the standard 
 of excellence in his group is held out to him, and everything is 
 calculated to brin^ him into conformity with it. The function of 
 the family with the child is in terms of the standard; the social 
 body is conscious of its unity. The group is in general greater 
 than the family. 
 
 In all this we see a simple group morality, to ignore which is 
 to be delinquent; the family and the larger group co-operating in 
 furthering conformity and discountenancing non-conformity, there 
 being always 'a tendency to recognize the interdependence of all in 
 the social body. This tendency most vitally affects the juvenile 
 member of the group, his status, his training, his treatment in case 
 of delinquency. The broadening vision of things reveals mutual 
 responsibility. The child must obey the voice of the group; the 
 latter must protect the former. Clearer and clearer the situation 
 grows, here and there crystallizing into laws, everywhere promot- 
 ing a higher ideal for the child, and always creating the machinery 
 for more perfect harmony. The growth is slow; generations are 
 days. But this tendency prophesies a time when the child shall 
 have become a figure quite central in the consideration of the 
 group. That time is here. But it is easier to learn that the Sab- 
 bath is made for man than that the group is created for the child. 
 
 6 Bancroft, "Native Races of the Pacific States," i, 169, 197, 242. 7 Ib. i, 219. 
 
 8 Eastman, "Indian Boyhood, 1 ' loc. cit. 
 
 9 Featherman, "Social History of the Races of Mankind," ii, 303. 
 
 10 Bonwick, "The Daily Life of the Tasmanians," 60. 
 
 11 "Native Tribes of Central A stra/;a," 212. 
 
 12 Bancroft, "Native Races of the Pacific States," i:8o, 412. 
 
PART II 
 
 THE DEVELOPMENT OF SPECIAL LEGISLATION FOR 
 THE JUVENILE DELINQUENT 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 EARLY AND INCIDENTAL LEGISLATION 
 
 The foregoing sections have dealt with conditions which de- 
 manded only unwritten law. Furthermore, nothing is observable, 
 as a rule, which concerns itself with the special class now so well 
 differentiated as to bear the name "juvenile delinquent." Such a 
 class implies closely formulated laws and machinery for enforcing 
 them, and something akin to modern urban life, with dense popu- 
 lation, and life in many respects abnormal and loose. What early 
 child life was and what forces controlled it were the real inquiries. 
 Having ascertained some of the facts, we are ready to proceed to 
 the study of some of the early and incidental legislation which is a 
 sure index of the emergence of the class giving rise to our inquiries. 
 
 The earliest recognition of the rights of children was evidently 
 in regard to property. As a matter of policy the early Caesars 
 granted to soldiers the right to retain all properties acquired in 
 war; it no longer belonged to their fathers. In 178 A. D. it was 
 decreed that mother and son "should stand in immediate line of 
 succession, an evidence of the fast-growing feeling of the leading 
 jurists. I In the Justinian code of 527 the laws of family, property 
 and succession were so changed that we may say that legally the 
 child had become a person. 2 But progress was exceedingly slow. 
 "In the seventh century even the church was compelled to allow 
 that in case of necessity an English father might sell into slavery 
 a son who was not yet seven years old. An older boy could not 
 be sold without his consent." 3 The same was 'true on the Conti : 
 nent among the Teutons even Mte in the Middle Ages, although 
 the exercise of the right seems to have become obsolete. 4 
 
 In this general attitude towards the child in the law of domestic 
 relations there was promise of emancipation. But there was still 
 another obstacle. The delinquent child must cdme under the 
 criminal law, and there were yet centuries to come before there 
 could be clear distinction between child and a^dult on this basis. 
 Punishment took little account of the person committing a forbid- 
 den act, or his motive; its prime consideration was" the act, or the 
 one injured, and its spirit that of vengeance. So long as this was 
 true, a criminal was a criminal, irrespective of his age, and the 
 only possible alleviation of the situation was, if the delinquent 
 were a child, to neglect to bring him to trial at all, to ignore his 
 delinquency, which was neither wise nor common. 
 
 i Iee, "Historical Jurisprudence," pp. 266-7. 2 Ib. 306-7. 
 
 3 Pollock and Maitland, "Hist, of English Law," ii, 436-7. 
 
 4 Hearn, "Aryan Household," 93. 
 
 23 
 
24 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 The early observation of the close bond between dependency 
 and delinquency furnished another working direction. Children 
 who were neglected or vagabond inevitably failed to observe laws. 
 To prevent such from becoming delinquent was the aim of much of 
 the early, incidental legislation. The Apprenticeship laws of the 
 time of Henry the Eighth (1491-1547) provided that children be- 
 tween the ages of 5 and 14 who were found begging or unemployed 
 were to be apprenticed to tradesmen. Under Elizabeth (1533- 
 1603) they were sent to the workhouse. In 1756, a society was 
 formed which furnished clothing for 'these unfortunates and sent 
 them off to sea whenever possible. The Philanthropic Society in 
 1788 founded the Farm school at Redhill the forerunner of many 
 private institutions soon to follow. All this was preventive work, 
 but often of a doubtful sort. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 SPECIAL LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS STATES 
 
 /. England. While the patria potestas had full force in Rome, 
 the father was responsible for the acts of his children just as he was 
 as owner responsible for the acts of his slaves and animals. 1 But 
 when this was broken up and the child became legally a person, 
 there went along with what rights he had certain responsibilities. 
 In criminal law there grew up a feeling that the child under seven 
 should be held responsible for nothing. Among the Germanic 
 peoples usually the child did not assume rights and responsibilities 
 until the age of twelve, when he was formally invested with the 
 implements of war. Early English law hesitated between the two 
 ages. In Anglo-Norman days the age of twelve was favored, 
 "while a seven-year limit appears in later criminal law as the sub- 
 ject of a presumption against criminal intent," the influence being 
 probably Roman. 2 x At the same time there was a strong tendency 
 in practice to consider*the intent of the action immaterial.' Thus, 
 whenever there was manifested a disposition to exempt the infant 
 from punishment because of his tender years, it was forbidden 
 because age and intent theoretically had nothing to do with the 
 case. Until the person became the centre of attention in criminal 
 cases, the feelings of judge or lawyer had to be satisfied if at all 
 under the guise of some device or irregularity. Early in the sev- 
 enteenth century the infant was ranked with the lunatic as "liable 
 civilly on the ground that the intent (i. e. bad intent, bad motive) 
 was immaterial." 3 This was a miserable compromise. Gradual-' 
 ly the Roman influence grew until it became English common law 
 that the child under 7 was exempt from punishment as incap- 
 able of entertaining criminal intent. A like presumption was 
 allowed for those between 7 and 14, but it might be rebutted. 
 After 14 one was presumed to have sufficient capacity and must 
 affirmatively show the contrary. 4 It is not necessary to follow 
 this development closely; the emergence of the child as a legal 
 person is clear in the observation of typical cases here and there in 
 legal history. 
 
 There was no significant movement in England before the 
 second quarter of the nineteenth century. The law of August 10, 
 1838, provided for the establishment of a juvenile prison at Park- 
 hurst, and the treatment of the inmates was left largely to the 
 discretion of the officials. The preamble to the law indicates that 
 
 1 O. W. Holmes, The Common I,aw, pp. 6 ff. 
 
 2 J. H. Wigmore in Harvard L,aw Review, vii, 447. 3 Ib. vii, 448. , 
 4 Tiffany, Persons and Domestic Relations, pp. 401-2. ,, 
 
 25 
 
26 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 the Queen had been in the habit of pardoning juvenile offenders to 
 the care of private charitable institutions. But such institutions 
 refused to undertake the responsibility and care of the harder 
 cases. "The same difficulty is experienced today in England. 5 
 In 26 years this prison was closed, partly because the private 
 institutions had taken advantage so largely of their opportunity to 
 relieve the state, and partly because superceded by the institutions 
 established in accord with the Reformatory and Industrial Schools 
 Act of 1865 and similar acts. These institutions have never been 
 provided by the state. Reformatories had been founded privately, 
 and after 1854 they were certified by the Secretary of State and 
 inspected by an Inspector of Prisons. In 1866 a special Inspector 
 of Reformatories was appointed. The Reformatories provided for 
 offenders under 16, for not less than two nor more than five years, 
 "in addition to imprisonment in gaol not less than fourteen days" 
 (1854), which was later amended to ten days for both England and 
 Scotland. According to Sec. 14 of the Law of 1866 no offender 
 under 10 was to be sent to a reformatory, unless "either the sen- 
 tence were passed at Assizes or Quarter Sessions, or he had been 
 previously charged with an offence punishable with penal servitude 
 or imprisonment." Thus the English Reformatory is closely re- 
 lated to the Prison. Except as affected by changes in other insti- 
 tutions and~by minor changes in the laws, the English Reform- 
 atories exist today (1906) practically as they did a quarter of a 
 century ago. 6 
 
 The Industrial School is the mainstay in England in juvenile 
 correction. Dating back to 1854 (Scotland) and 1857 (England), 
 it has been variously adapted to include mendicant and destitute 
 and morally imperilled children in general. The age limit is 14, 
 and at that age the parent may claim the children and return them 
 to any sort of environment. 
 
 The lines protecting the youth were a bit more closely drawn 
 by the Elementary Education Act of 1876, providing for day in- 
 dustrial schools and the more extended use of industrial schools. 
 The Summary Jurisdiction Act of 1879 and the Probation of First 
 Offenders Act of 1887 are based upon the idea of summary hearing 
 fr>" first offences and dismissal upon payment of costs, with admon- 
 it i; or suspension qf sentence dependent upon good behavior, 
 and in graver cases with the alternative of payment of a fine. 7 
 The Howard Association laments in its report of 1897 that the Act 
 of 1887 is not used to the proper extent. This is unfortunate, 
 indicating the reluctance of the English people to fairly enter into 
 the probation system, so popular in the United States. 
 
 The truant schools of England are very effective, not only keep- 
 ing the child from the street, but affording him instruction of a 
 very practical sort. There is also a class of youths in English 
 prisons called "juvenile adults" (over sixteen) who are subjects of 
 
 5 Report of Comptroller of Prisons, New South Wales, on Prisons of Europe and Amer- 
 ica, 1904, p. 51. .. 6 See Cane, "Punishment of Juvenile Offenders," p. 202 ff. 
 7 See Drahms, "The Criminal," 305-6. 
 
SPECIAL LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS STATES 27 
 
 special treatment, but this is not a significant thing. Industrial 
 and truant schools are rendering great service. There seems to be 
 some hesitation, however, in England in claiming full power over 
 the child for the state, even when the parent has proven his in- 
 ability to fill a parent's place for him. 
 
 2. France. In the French law of 17 91. the distinction was clear- 
 ly drawn between the child who had acted with discernment of the 
 meaning of his act and the one who had not. The former was 
 rigorously punished as we view the matter, but little allowance be- 
 ing made- for youth, while the latter was either returned to his 
 family or sent to a house of correction to remain not later than his 
 twentieth year. 8 All the past experience was formulated in the 
 Code Penal of 1810. Separation of young and old offenders was 
 contemplated, but was not carried out. 9 This idea was ahead of its 
 time, and indeed in the small prisons would have been impossible. 
 The second quarter of the century was one of experiment and 
 progress. Demetz and Lucas advanced the belief that agricultural 
 training would win the delinquents over to an orderly life. Their 
 institutions were subsidized by the state, and became the models 
 for others in private hands. The legal expression of this period 
 came August 5, 1850, and the advance is brought out into relief. 
 The right of youthful prisoners of both sexes under 17 to religious, 
 moral and trade education was recognized, and the sexes were 
 separated. "Colonies penetentiares" with strenuous discipline 
 and agricultural and trade education took the place of the houses 
 of correction. These were either public or private. The children 
 given more than two years sentence were sent to "colonies correc- 
 tionelles," public institutions in France and Algiers. Another 
 feature was that those liberated were in some sense given over to 
 the care of public charity. 10 This tendency is emphasized in the 
 law of July 24, 1889, "for the'protection of children maltreated or 
 morally abandoned," which protection is extended by the charity 
 authorities, and in the law of July 24, 1898, which provides that 
 the child shall be given over to a parent, or other person, or char- 
 itable institution or cared for from the public charity funds. 11 
 In the former law the right of the state to take the child from the 
 family in which it was morally imperilled, was recognized; the 
 state exercised its power not through the criminal law but through 
 the arm of charity. Again this path is followed in the slight 
 changes of the law of June, 1904. This seems to be characteristic 
 of the French view of the situation. It is another recognition of 
 the close relation of dependency and delinquency, but other coun- 
 tries have thus fat chosen to separate the classes. 
 
 J. Germany. Up to the middle of the nineteenth century the 
 Roman and canonical law contention that the child under seven is 
 absolutely incapable of crime was nominally in force in German 
 states, but as elsewhere its complete action was rendered impos- 
 
 8 Raux, "Nos Jeunes De'tenvs," 221 ff. 9 Krohne "Gefa.engniskunde," 83. 
 
 10 Raux. "ATos Jeunes Pe'tenus," 261. 
 
 11 "Tra/'te* Theoretiqtte et Pratique D' Assistance Publique," H. Derouin, pp. 27-30. 
 
28 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 sible because of the strength of the idea of retribution and terror- 
 izing. In several German states there were two legal divisions of 
 children, those of absolute and those of relative responsibility. 
 The ages are rather higher than we are accustomed to think of, 
 the first period varying in its higher limit between 10 and 12 years 
 and the second between 14 and 21. Bavaria had such a law as 
 early as 1813, Saxony in 1838 and Wirtemberg in 1839. The 
 Prussian code of 1851 followed the French lead, turning aside 
 from the inflexible law and leaving it to the judge to determine 
 whether the child had acted with an understanding of his action. 
 The law of May 15, 1871, (somewhat altered in 1876) the first that 
 might with justice be spoken of as German law, declared that 
 criminal capacity does not exist in the child under 12, that it is 
 doubtful between 12 and 18, and that even beyond 18 there is no 
 legal presumption for it, i. e. it must be affirmatively proven. 
 This advancing of the ages and breaking from the hard law which 
 regarded only age and not individual development was no small 
 step. 
 
 Yet the close of the century found the child in Germany under 
 a penal code that carried along with its decisions the stigma of 
 crime, the pernicious short term of confinement in an institution of 
 reform (Bessentngsanstolf), and limited employment of the deferred 
 sentence, i. e. sentence which is not operative until a.subsequent 
 act of wrong again brings the offender before the court. In 1900 
 Gernlany embodied her experience with juvenile delinquents in a 
 "Law of Educational Guardianship" (12) with the result that many 
 of the "leaks" were stopped and child-saving tremendously pro- 
 moted. Following the American pattern, it was made possible 
 that any child in any manner morally imperilled could be brought 
 before the court and dealt with without criminal taint and irrespec- 
 tive of the claims of incompetent, unfit parents. In these, respects 
 Germany is abreast of the best legislation. Her particular contri- 
 bution lies in having made specific financial provision for every 
 possible case. Our own laws are often rendered inoperative by 
 lack of funds. 
 
 4. The United States. We can afford to pass by the legisla- 
 tion of other countries as either duplicating that of England, 
 France or Germany or as not in any manner significant. Italy 
 has been greatly interested in the psychological, physiological and 
 pathological aspects of crime, both of adults and juveniles, but 
 has, perhaps for that very reason, contributed nothing of especial 
 value in the treatment of juvenile delinquents who are not crim- 
 inal. The countries of northern Europe offer nothing advanced. 
 Like the others, they have depended largely on private interest 
 and private means to do what little has been done. 13 
 
 As in England, the great word of the nineteenth century for the 
 United States in regard to juvenile delinquents was "correction." 
 W- 
 
 12 Das Preussische Fuerzorgeerziehungsgesetz vom 2 Juli, 1900, C. von Massow. 
 
 13 Krohne, "Gefaengnisknnde," loc. cit. 
 
SPECIAL LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS STATES 29 
 
 Separate confinement of children in prison and their assignment to 
 reformatories with a view to their correction took precedence over 
 any preventive measures. As a matter of fact this correction was 
 undertaken to prevent crime; now we are beyond the prevention 
 of crime in the ordinary sense. Our aim would find itself accom- 
 plished far short of that. The end of the century revealed to us 
 the fact that ordinarily we are not dealing with crime at all in deal- 
 ing with children. The break between the centuries marks a pass- 
 ing from the reformatory to the probation system as the centre of 
 attention. 1825 was the year of the first reformatory in this coun- 
 try, the House of Refuge of New York, and uninterruptedly we 
 have developed this institution until the Elmira Reformatory and 
 many others which have followed its lead stand as models for the 
 world. 14 To trace that development here is unnecessary. More 
 profitable would be the noting of the growth of certain accessorial 
 ideas now central in our system, namely the probationary powers 
 of the court, the terminable sentence and the parental power of the 
 state. All these are a reflection of the rapidly changing sentiment 
 of people who, as teachers, psychologists, parents, administrators 
 in many capacities, were creating a new child-world. This new 
 world proves incompatible with much that is in the old, therefore 
 an expression of the situation in new laws and new institutions. 
 Carrying along with us our old institutions, public and private, 
 and much of our former mental and legal equipment, and careful 
 and conservative as to innovations, we have entered into a new era, 
 looked upon as experimental by many, but full of such promise 
 and achievement and backed by so much sanity and experience 
 that we are very confident in the working directions adopted. 
 
 As early as 1853 Mary Carpenter in her ''Juvenile Delinquents" 
 tells of a recommendation rejected by Parliament in which were 
 closely foreshadowed the terminable sentence and large probation- 
 ary powers of the court. This came from students of juvenile 
 delinquency and was evidently premature. It was not probation 
 in our present sense, being merely a form of suspended sentence 
 with no oversight except parental. This was already present 
 in the United States and England in the informal and sympathetic 
 administration of the laws by intelligent and kindly judges. To 
 make the necessary incorporation of it in legal form was left as a 
 task 6f the twentieth century. 
 
 The actual recognition and approval of the probation system 
 which employs the probation officer professionally is found in the 
 legislation of Michigan and Massachusetts in the '70s. 15 The 
 parent of the probation system was not this or that legislator or 
 legislature, but common-sense understanding of child nature. It 
 is a negative credit to have framed a law at the end of the nine- 
 teenth century providing apparatus for the treatment of the child 
 as a child and not as a criminal. That apparatus will later be 
 considered. Just now it is enough to analyze in the large the legal 
 
 14 Drahms, "The Criminal, 1 ' Chap, on Juveniles. 15 Charities, Jan. 7, 1905. 
 
30 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 temper of the United States towards the child. 
 
 The United States is indebted directly to England for the 
 transmission of the old common-law heritage of the responsibility 
 of the child for his acts. But the former country has proceeded 
 with considerable independence of all countries to the advanced 
 position she occupies at present. Some of the comparatively re- 
 cent legal expressions are most instructive. One writer says, 
 "The rights of parents result from their duties, being given them 
 by law to aid in the fulfillment of their obligations * * * This is 
 the true foundation of parental power." 16 "The parent has only 
 a moderate degree of authority over the child's person, which 
 authority relaxes as the child grows older." 17 "The cardinal 
 principle * * * is to regard the benefit of the infant, to make the 
 welfare of the children paramount." 18 This is a tremendous con- 
 cession; the child is truly a person and the attitude of the state is 
 broadly social. The child's welfare and conduct are of concern to 
 it, therefore it will assure the child of fair treatment. Schouler 
 further generalizes, (19) "In this country the doctrine is universal 
 that the courts of justice may, in their sound discretion, and when 
 the morals or safety or interests of the children strongly require it, 
 withdraw their custody from the father and confer it upon the 
 mother, or take the children from both parents and place the care 
 and custody of them elsewhere." Both he and Hochheimer (20) 
 contend that there is far more hesitancy in England in the State 
 exercise of parental function than in America. Here the right of 
 the state is fully admitted and clearly expressed. Nearly fifteen 
 years ago, September 1891, Mr. Charles Martindale wrote in the 
 "North American Review": "It is a vulgar supposition that the 
 parent has some natural property in his children; that children 
 'belong to their parents.' Such is not the legal status of the in- 
 fant. From the time of his birth, the infant is a subject of the 
 State, having an individuality separate from its parents, with dis- 
 tinct rights of person ano^ property, with separate obligations to 
 and claims upon the sovereign. The only right of the parent 
 recognized by the law is one of guardianship. The right and 
 custody of their children * * * comes to parents not by the course 
 of nature, not by birth or blood, but is derived from the State, and 
 must be exercised under the authority and supervision- of the State. 
 * * * Parents are intrusted with the persons and education of 
 their children under the natural presumption that the children will 
 be properly taken care of and brought up with a due education in 
 literature, morals and religion, and that they will be treated with 
 kindness and affection. But whenever this presumption is re- 
 moved * * * the Court of Chancery may interfere and deprive 
 them of their custody and appoint a suitable person to act as 
 guardian." The paper further indicates that this has long been 
 the theory of the matter. Yet in practice it is not only compar- 
 
 16 Schouler, "Domestic Relations," sth ed. 383. 17 Ib. 384. 18 Ib. 390. 
 
 19 Ib. 389. 20 "Custody of Infants," pp. 33-34. 
 
SPECIAL LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS STATES 31 
 
 atively new, but is strictly limited. In France, Germany and the 
 United States it is the presupposition to all action. On it are 
 built the special Children's Court and the whole Probation System, 
 and the use that is made of the various classes of institutions to 
 which children are assigned from the Court. 
 
 This, as applied to the definite situation, is mediated in the 
 various Juvenile Court Laws of many States of the Union. Nine- 
 teen States have such laws and six others have a probation system 
 in operation without the special court. 21 In general the elements 
 of the law are present in the California Law, approved Feb. 26, 
 
 1903. In the first section of the law, the "Juvenile Delinquent" 
 is defined, also the "Dependent" who comes under the same law: 
 
 )"This act shall apply only to children under the age of sixteen 
 years not now or hereafter inmates of a State institution, or any 
 reform school for juvenile offenders, or any institution incorporated 
 under the laws of the State for the care and education of children. 
 
 For the purposes of this act the words 'dependent child' shall 
 mean any child under the age of sixteen years that is found beg- 
 ging or receiving or gathering alms (whether actually begging or 
 under the pretext of selling or offering for sale anything) or being 
 in any street, road or public place for the purpose of so begging, 
 gathering or receiving alms; or that is found wandering and not 
 having any home or settled place of abode, or proper guardianship, 
 or visible means of subsistence; or that is found destitute, or whose 
 home, by reason of neglect, cruelty or depravity on the part of its 
 parents, guardian or other person in whose care it may be, is an 
 unfit place for such child; or that frequents the company of reputed 
 criminals or prostitutes, or that is found living or being in any 
 house of prostitution or assignation; or that habitually visits, with- 
 out parent or guardian, any saloon, place of entertainment where 
 any spirituous liquors, or wine or intoxicating or malt liquors are 
 sold, exchanged or given away; or who is incorrigible; or who is a 
 persistent truant from school. The words 'delinquent child' shall 
 include any child under the age of sixteen years who violates any 
 law of this State or any ordinance of any town, city or. county of 
 this State." 
 
 Sections follow providing, "for the appointment of probation 
 officers, and prescribing their duties and powers; providing for 
 the separation of children from adults when confined in jails or 
 other institutions; providing for the appointment of boards to in- 
 vestigate the qualifications of organizations receiving children 
 under this act, and prescribing the duties of such boards; and 
 providing when proceedings under this act shall be admissible in 
 evidence." 22 
 
 Specifically the recent laws have also made provision for bring- 
 ing any child who would come under the act to the attention of the 
 court by any individual who judges the child subject for such 
 
 21 Charities, Jan. 7, 1905. 
 
 22 See "International Prison Commission Children's Courts in the United States," 
 
 1904, House Doc. No. 701, pp. 165 ff. 
 
32 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 attention, whether that person be a representative of the law in 
 any capacity or not; (23) furthermore that no child under 12 (14 in 
 Colorado) shall be imprisoned in jail under any circumstances; (24) 
 that the' religious preferences of the parent shall be respected in 
 the assignment of the child to an institution or family; (25) that 
 the child may under proper conditions, if dependent, be sur- 
 rendered by the one having the right to so dispose of the child for 
 adoption. 26 
 
 More significant, even, than these specific provisions is the 
 general clause appended in practically identical phraseology in all 
 the State Laws: 
 
 "This act shall be liberally construed, to the end that its pur- 
 pose may be carried out, to- wit: That the care, custody and disci- 
 pline of a child shall approximate as nearly as may be that which 
 should be given by its parents, and, in all cases where it can be 
 properly done, the child be placed in an approved family, with 
 people of the same religious belief, and become a member of the 
 family, by legal adoption or otherwise." 27 
 
 5. Conclusion. The tendencies observable long before there 
 emerged any special legislation in behalf of juvenile delinquents 
 are now settling down into working order as a part of our legal 
 and institutional equipment. Some may-say that very early the 
 child was quite as truly a member of the stgte as of the family. 
 It is evidently true that as a subject for discipline and general 
 parental oversight he was never a member ^oT^fhe state. That 
 body's first care for him specifically was in protecting him in his 
 property rights from the cupidity of dishonest men. Criminal law 
 of the state never went farther than barely to recognize that he 
 was not an adult; it never defined him. It accorded him confine- 
 ment in prison apart from adults, and there he waited to be dis- 
 covered and set up in his rightful place. It was the teacher and 
 the psychologist and the moralist in his many capacities who 
 rescued him. Through the efforts of such it may be said with 
 some justice that the modern sculptor of unfortunate childhood 
 when he carves a child carves a child; not a miniature man, but an 
 embryo man. 
 
 We have yet to complete the learning of one supreme lesson 
 the same lesson that our world of labor in all its distress cannot 
 learn, but must as the alternative to its misery. Law is a resul- 
 tant thing, only a somewhat more final expression of experience 
 gained, in this case, from long dealing with the child and careful 
 study of his nature and his activities. But law may be persistent, 
 conservative to the point of harmful obstinacy when questioned by 
 a new mass of experience and new judgments even of expert 
 specialists. Such has been the case. We put a halo over law. 
 We must put a halo over something which shall be final authority 
 
 23 Sec. 4, Illinois Law. See "Juvenile Courts," 2nd ed. p. 61. Compiled by T. D. Hur- 
 ley, 1904. 24 Sec. n, Illinois Law; Sec. 9, California Law. 25 Sec. 17, Illinois Law. 
 26 Illinois Law, Sec. 15. 27 Sec. 13, California Law. 
 
SPECIAL LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS STATES 33 
 
 for us. But that halo becomes a dark cloud obscuring truth and 
 right when it imparts to Law absolute finality and perfection. 
 Law is a secondary thing, derived from and generalizing experi- 
 ence. We are getting a tremendous amount of new experience in 
 regard to the child, which must be incorporated into the laws and 
 they must be flexibly enough interpreted and administered to favor 
 child nature. This brief glance at the matter of the status of the 
 child through the ages ought to convince us that progress has been 
 criminally slow. The conservatism of Law has been one reason 
 for this, especially in times since Law began to be expressed more 
 formally. Let this never be charged again. Let Law hold itself 
 open in spirit; let legislators and administrators make and use 
 laws not as an end but as a means. In such times as these it 
 should be a corallary to every law concerning juveniles that it is 
 soon to be remodelled or replaced if the interest of the children 
 and our better understanding of them demand it. 
 
 If we were to refrain from looking into the future we might say, 
 after tracing the development of sentiment concerning the child 
 and the reluctant assignment to him of the place of a legal person, 
 that our present institutions which really assure him his place are 
 the flower of it all. But already the prophet voice is heard crying 
 the hope that we shall not long have to endure many of the exist- 
 ing features even of the special juvenile court or the probation 
 system, and that the institutions to which we have to send children 
 may soon lose all the characteristics that they have inherited from 
 another regime, and reflect more consistently the spirit of the 
 modern view of childhood unfortunately or accidentally delinquent. 
 In recent years we have come at the matter with a rush, and have 
 swept away injustices and in a multitude of details begun to recon-- 
 struct our apparatus. There is great promise that the momentum 
 gained is such that we shall not be condemned to too early crystal- 
 lization of principle or too finally committed to methods. Progress 
 here as elsewhere consists in a large degree in keeping stirred up 
 into the realm of the questioned and the admittedly improvable 
 everything that threatens to settle down into tradition. We need 
 not fear chaos so long as we are guarded on one side by ultra- 
 conservative legislators and on the other by careful, far-sighted 
 specialists who have reverence at once for precedent and for un- 
 found truth. It is in this spirit that today we are beginning to 
 look upon our recent constructions and to reinterpret them in the 
 light of our rapidly growing mass of experience with and apprecia- 
 tion of childhood both normal and abnormal. The first step 
 towards criticism is description. Therefore shall we briefly de- 
 scribe our present machinery for dealing with juvenile delinquents. 
 
PART III 
 
 THE APPARATUS FOR THE TREATMENT OF 
 JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 THE JUVENILE COURT 
 
 /. Origin. Logically the Juvenile Court is an offspring of the 
 .Criminal Court, made necessary by the full recognition of the fact 
 that the child is ordinarily not criminal and that the Criminal 
 Court taints the child brought into it with the character given it by 
 its dealing with confirmed criminals. Historically it is of the same 
 origin. Even now the judge of the Children's Court is ordinarily 
 simply detailed from the older Court. Though the way had long 
 been leading up to it, the first real Juvenile Court was established 
 by Sec. 3 of the Illinois Juvenile Court Law, in force July 1, 1901. 
 Many States have followed, and in the main have followed closely. 
 
 2. The Judge. In some cases there is but one judge acting 
 in the Juvenile Court, though the duties of that Court may not be 
 sufficient to occupy his whole time. Whatever cases come before 
 this Court, either for the first time or as 'repeaters," he passes 
 upon, being always in the peculiar atmosphere of this Court and 
 never carrying over into it from the other courts anything that is 
 foreign to it. It is very important that the same judge should 
 continue the hearing of a case in which he has been interested 
 before. On the other hand, it is quite common that the judges of 
 the circuit court take turns in presiding over this court. In the 
 county in which Indianapolis is situated the presiding judge is 
 elected like any state officer. In Colorado, jurisdiction is given 
 solely to the Judge of the County Court, while in other localities 
 the police courts and justices' courts exercise jurisdiction. Thus 
 there is great variety of usage in the matter of appointment. 
 
 The term of service and the powers of the Judge are subject"V 
 also to local custom. But the relation of the Judge to the proba- j 
 tion system is largely a matter of personal preference, except 
 where his other duties absorb his attention entirely. It is in some/ 
 instances possible for the Judge to be in effect the chief probation 
 officer of his Court, taking close, personal interest in the children 
 brought before him, even to the extent of following them up 
 through various reforming or preventive agencies. Such a force 
 is Judge Lindsey of Denver. But ordinarily that is not possible. 
 However, experience seems to have shown that in general the men 
 have been chosen or appointed as judges who have most sympathy 
 with childhood and therefore are most likely to succeed. In fact 
 the Indiana county above referred to has restricted the eligibility to 
 the position so that only a man of forty years of age and a parent 
 may be elected. 1 
 
 i Charities, Jan. 7, 1905, 336. 
 
 37 
 
38 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 3. The Jury. The jury is a remnant of the adults' court in 
 most cases dispensed with altogether, in a few instances existing, 
 but almost functionless. The reason for its survival is the desire 
 to accord to all the right of trial by jury, on the part of those 
 living so far back in the past that they do not realize that there 
 are really few or no trials in the Children's Court. But the ap- 
 pendage is harmless. In the Chicago Court the jury is ignored 
 and often inust inquire to learn even so much as the disposition of 
 the case. In a serious offence the Judge may well feel reluctance 
 about passing individual judgment against a criminal child, and 
 the jury has a place, but the sentiment is strongly against it, as 
 interfering with the moral and educational influence of the Court, 
 and as increasing publicity. 
 
 4. Legal Representative for the Child. In some Children's 
 Courts a lawyer is provided for the child, perhaps to protect him 
 from selfish or wicked parents, or to aid the judge and the proba- 
 tion officer in getting at the whole truth of the case. As such he 
 performs a very necessary service, yet it is a fair question whether 
 the same service could not quite as well be done by the judge or 
 the officer, the former settling legal questions and the latter look- 
 ing up the facts of the case. It is a great advantage to the Court 
 if the probation officer is a good lawyer. The whole atmosphere 
 of the institution seems to argue against such a representative 
 simply as a means of assuring fairness to the child. Furthermore, 
 a lawyer often influences the child to deceive, disturbs the decision 
 of the judge and sometimes sends away the child justified in 
 flagrant or doubtful violation of the law, and looking upon the 
 Juvenile Court as an enemy or at least an institution lacking in the 
 very thing it means to assume parental interest in every child. 
 None cares to deprive any member of the State of the right to a 
 fair hearing and protection against injustice, but the Children's 
 Court is an educational institution seeking both to deter from a 
 path full of dangers and to point the way to clean and useful man- 
 hood and womanhood, and it is bad pedagogy to set the child 
 against it. We are inclining rapidly to this view of things even 
 where the children are evidently vicious and criminal. Prevention 
 is very reluctant to give way to Correction today. 
 
 5. Procedure. In what does the dignity of the Law consist? 
 'A few judges still insist that it consists in its ctothing and its 
 bearing a dignity that is often very impressive, but like the anal- 
 ogous dignity of individual gentlemen, not always quick and un- 
 bending and sympathetic enough to do the simplest and greatest 
 services. Is there not vastly more dignified and worthy human 
 nature shown in a judge who will take a child aside, screening him 
 from publicity and consequent harm, stating his own case to him, 
 urging thoughtfulness and industry, deploring bad associations, 
 planting in him the germ of self-help, than in the one who, because 
 of a false notion of his office or pique at his assignment to a 
 Children's Court, insists on publishing the history of a sensitive 
 
THE JUVENILE COURT 39 
 
 child to an audience of curious listeners through the established 
 procedure? Law is a schoolmaster to a child, but the best school- 
 master is not the legalist of that type. It is the law that is written 
 on the heart, revealing a heart-beat at every letter, not the hard, 
 cold law of statute books that the child learns. vThe judge as man 
 and not the judge as judge is the best mediator between the group 
 standard as found in the law and the child. When we shall have 
 fully learned that the law is made for the child and not the child 
 for the law we shall easily fall into a way of conducting proceed- 
 ings that will turn the court-room into a home and the judge into 
 a parent to every unfortunate child brought before him. The 
 origin of the Children's Court is altogether too evident in its con- 
 duct. The time will come when there will be no public court- 
 room for the child, when we shall deny that all we have stripped 
 from the police court to make way for the child in the new court is 
 the rogues' gallery. Dignity will be denned in terms of effective- 
 ness, not show. We are somewhat content to move slowly in this 
 matter beyond a certain point for the reason that this is an in- 
 cidental question, the solution of which depends upon that of 
 another and vastly more fundamental one the adjustment made 
 necessary by the fact that machinery employed through centuries 
 upon centuries in turning out the criminal grist of the world and 
 furnished its motive power by the spirit of vengeance, repression 
 or at best reformation, is now set to work upon youthful, unformed 
 lives, and the motive power changed already, so far as it touches 
 the child, into prevention by development. 
 
 6. Place of Detention. By law some of the States forbid the 
 placing of children under a certain age in jail, even while waiting 
 for a hearing in the Court. Therefore it has been necessary to 
 provide a place of detention for such of the children as cannot be 
 sent to a home or kept under the guardianship of some interested 
 person. Some cities have founded a home, superintended by a 
 man and woman who shall exert proper influences over the boys. 
 In some cases the boys are kept in these homes for a considerable 
 length of time, before or even after their appearance before the 
 Court. Perhaps it may be deemed right to dismiss the case with- 
 out a hearing because of the good influence of this institution. In 
 other places the old ideas have exerted such force that the law is 
 met by the provision of a cell (!!) adjoining the court-room, in 
 which the child is locked pending his hearing. Of course this is 
 archaic. The detention home may be made a great feature in 
 child-saving, especially among the homeless waifs whose lot will 
 almost inevitably be cast in the great cities, who have the taste of 
 the city and can not be "placed out" in country homes. Coupled 
 with personal interest on the part of superintendents and matrons 
 and opening, as they do, very evident opportunities to settlement 
 and church workers, they may yet develop into far more than they 
 were intended to be. Established to fulfil a temporary function, 
 they reveal a field not unlike that of the "homes" or "lodges" or 
 
40 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 ' 'lodging houses" for homeless men, with the significant distinc- 
 tion that, the juvenile population being less nomadic, there is 
 chance for permanent betterment where the other institutions are 
 hardly more than for temporary accommodation to most of their 
 inmates. 
 
 7. Juvenile Courts and Parents. It is the unanimous opinion 
 of workers for children that delinquency may more often be traced 
 to the home life or the lack of it than to any other cause or number 
 of causes. As remedial measures the Court may remove the child 
 from his environment or, leaving him there, seek to improve it for 
 him. It 'often happens that the child's delinquency is due to a 
 train of circumstances of which the parents know nothing, and all 
 that is necessary is to call the attention of the parents to the life of 
 the child. ' Unfortunately it is the rule that not simply the ingenu- 
 ity of the child in concealing his activities; and his associations 
 from his parents is the great factor*, but rather the latters' ignor- 
 ance or carelessness or wrong. v Therefore the attitude of trfe 
 Court towards them must be active; it must encourage, instruct, 
 aid parents in their task. Thus far the Court has found great 
 difficulty in dealing with those parents who resent the interference 
 of the Law in their domestic life, or who are so vicious or ignorant 
 that while in general to be trusted with the children they occasion- 
 ally place themselves in the position of actually contributing to 
 their delinquency. The most common case in point, perhaps, is 
 in sending the child to a saloon to buy liquor and thus putting 
 him in touch with a life that promises much danger to him. Such 
 an^act is 'punishable ordinarily, yet in the -legal process it has not 
 been shown with sufficient clearness that this is not only an act 
 reprehensible, but is such because of its consequences to the child. 
 The parent is punished, if at all, in one court, and the child in 
 another. Could a parent and child be brought before the same 
 court and this which is one offence be dealt with as such? The 
 situation brought forth considerable legal sparring for points, in 
 which common sejise won in spite of the lack of precedent. 
 Where it had been possible in all the Courts to bring the parents 
 in for a reprimand only, it is now possible in at least one to make 
 the charge against the parent rather than against the child, and to 
 administer the necessary corrections The Colorado "adult delin- 
 quent law" of 1903 reads as follows: 
 
 "Sec. 1. In all cases where any child shall be a delinquent 
 child or a juvenile delinquent person, as defined by the statute of 
 this state, the parent or parents, legal guardian or person having 
 custody of such child, or any other person, responsible for or by 
 any act encouraging, causing or contributing to the delinquency of 
 said child shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon trial and 
 conviction thereof shall be fined in a sum not to exceed one thou- 
 sand dollars ($1000) or imprisoned in the county jail for a period 
 not exceeding one (1) year, or by both such fine and imprison- 
 ment. The court may impose conditions upon any person found 
 
THE JUVENILE COURT 41 
 
 guilty under this act, and so long as such person shall comply 
 therewith to the satisfaction of the court the sentence imposed 
 may be suspended." 
 
 No other feature of the whole S}'stem is so much an innovation, 
 or so much an evidence of the strength of modern sentiment. It 
 justifies our hope that soon we shall be able in a hundred respects 
 to construct and reconstruct apparatus for dealing with the juve- 
 nile delinquent entirely on the basis of utility and common sense 
 and independent of useless traditions either in principle or method. 
 
 8. The Court and. Private Interest. ' 'Every reform," says 
 Emerson in his Essay on History, "was once a private opinion, 
 and when it shall be private opinion again it will solve the problem 
 of the age." It is too ea,sy to get into the beaten path of things. 
 It is easy enough to get out 'of it also, but to only the -few who 
 hardly find content in the beaten path. It is the private opinion, 
 the conviction of such spirits that insistently makes its way into 
 the life of 'others in the group, that formulates itself in Juvenile 
 Courts, and new laws and probation systems. The legal protes- 
 'sion at the beginning set ifself against the reform almost by neces- 
 sity, as did the police. Both are accustomed to look for fault and 
 delinquency and crime; the child-saver is looking for everything 
 else. Individuals with ttye teaching and the saving spirit wherever 
 they happened to be, espoused this cause. -Clubs with energy and 
 means to expend, judges who saw the error of fitting the child into 
 adults' clothing, charities associations and children's societies of 
 all sorts added their private conviction, bore the brunt of the" 
 reform and the construction and thfe expense until such time^as 
 private opinion should be "private opinion again" and everywhere. 
 Such is the general history of the movement. Balls, bazaars, 
 fairs, subscriptions, petitions, publication all sorts qf influence 
 h,ave been brought to bear wherever necessary in order to legalize 
 private opinion into public institution. Even now the State pro- 
 claims its only partial conversion in failing to provide adequate 
 means for the management of the system. Probation officers mus't 
 yet be privately paid, the expense of caring for children in many 
 cases is likewise neglected, surely, in view of ceaseless waste and 
 misexpenditure of public moneys, not for lack of funds, bnt for 
 lack of inclination. 
 
 Yet we can conceive of nothing so fortunate as all this. It is 
 the cause that attracts to itself strong advocates who are witling to 
 crusade for it, who find opposition and in meeting it find their 
 cause growing upon them and giving them a great message, that 
 finally is founded substantially. The judges and the lawyers who 
 opposed once are the strongest advocates for the very reason that 
 they know the value of the idea that conquered them. And it is 
 of inestimable worth to have had the advertising of this form of 
 child saving among so many individuals. The Juvenile Court 
 lobby has extended far beyond legislative halls, and the lobbyists 
 have been actuated by the consciousness of right and the call of 
 
42 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 long-suffering childhood. When, even with such rapid develop- 
 ment, we grow impatient that juvenile life is made to wait upon red 
 tape and undue conservatism, we may be quieted with the thought 
 that there is nothing to fear so much as a movement getting 
 beyond its average observers, or becoming crystallized into a form 
 to be laid aside because men have not seen it in the process of 
 crystallization. Or when we are tempted to think of the unforgiv- 
 able crime of not having distinguished between the juvenile delin- 
 quent and the adult criminal through the centuries, it is well to 
 reflect that it is the appreciation of the enormity of this very 
 offence that has made this institution one of the most popular and 
 significant in recent history, and in a comparatively brief period v 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 THE PROBATION SYSTEM 
 
 /. Origin. The probation system is a Topsy-like creation; it 
 ''just grew." How futile for this State or that to claim precedence 
 in this matter, identifying legislative approach to it with origins! 
 When we find the first administrator of the law whose heart and 
 decision registered a protest against clamping the criminal pro- 
 cedure over juvenile life, holding it rigidly in a mold too small and 
 altogether unfitting, we shall have found the source of this mighty 
 flowing. Perhaps that protest and like protests resulted only in 
 the dismissal of the cases in want of alternative possibility, but tha 
 legal mind is too keen and merciful and impartial notwithstanding 
 its weaknesses to overlook infringement of law. Revolt is never 
 completed until there is revolt to something as well as away from 
 something. The judge who revolted against sending a child to 
 company with criminals in jail, in that very act proved the exist- 
 ence of the spirit which made him turn about and help to provide 
 for the child's welfare by some means not yet legal. Ha went 
 beyond the law he was sworn to administer in releasing the child 
 who might be technically guilty of wrong, and he went outside the 
 pale of things legal for a remedy. Either he himself, not as judge 
 but as private citizen, exercised the rights always accorded to 
 greatheartedness, and entered upon a campaign of saving the child 
 to wholeness of life, or he co-operated with those who as private 
 citizens or institutions were committed to such service. "Every 
 reform was once private opinion." Yes, and every reformer a 
 prophet prophet of gradual acceptance of protests and final for- 
 mulation and application of something better. The early principle 
 of discernment or lack of discernment, responsibility or lack of 
 responsibility on the part of the child in his act, seen in French 
 and German codes was prophetic of probation. Likewise were 
 the principle of the suspended sentence during satisfactory be- 
 havior, the indeterminate sentence, separate confinement of juve- 
 niles and adults in prisons and the same thing extended in the 
 establishment of reformatories. Historically, probation has come 
 to us not as one of the series of devices but as a principle; not the 
 isolation of the child from the society he has offended or which 
 has harmed him, but the application of good to him through the 
 direct medium of lives sympathetic to those in the formative 
 period. If we may prophesy, strictly on the basis of the history of 
 child status and child treatment and with a view to the actual 
 turning of the attention of the race back upon its children, we 
 
 43 
 
44 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 may allow all sorts of variation in method, unlimited extension in 
 application, and yet insist that in principle, whether we name it 
 probation or patronage or education or religion, we cannot ad- 
 vance -we can be no more than parental in our attitude at best. 
 And that is enough. When we get this sweep of things, how un- 
 important it seems whether it was Judge Sanity of the City of 
 Puremont of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts or Judge Kindly 
 of Spotless Town who first informally applied the probation idea 
 to some youngster who was fortunate enough to "get caught 
 swipin' tilings!" 
 
 In the United States probation was operative in some form and 
 to some extent in a number of the older communities before Juve- 
 nile Court laws made specific provision for it on a much more 
 extensive plan. New York paroled children to individuals and to 
 ; the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children 
 for twenty years prior to our present laws. Statutory provision 
 for the step was made in Massachusetts as early as 1878 and 1880, 
 and at least as early as that Michigan covered practically the same 
 ground through its State Board of Charities and Correction. 1 
 Illinois and Indiana were both groping for light and relief, experi- 
 menting and preparing the way for advanced legislation. 
 
 But "probation" has within a half dozen years taken on a very 
 definite character. The impossibility of dealing with the child 
 under the criminal law became so patent to so many people, and 
 especially the disposition of the cases which actually need some 
 oversight became so problematical that some departure was in- 
 evitable. It was wrong in principle to simply turn loose the child 
 who had offended. There were no institutions entirely answering 
 the purpose, and the treatment in those institutions which could 
 receive the small minority of the children tried was very expensive 
 and not adequate to any more than the small minority. The 
 whole trend of the day was against "institutions." How would 
 men do? The very thing that not only the Courts and the Boards 
 of Charity and the Child Saving Societies had been seeking more 
 or less consciously, but that the spirit of the age demanded! The 
 Judge could not follow the child as he left the Court, not guilty in 
 a measure that would justify incarceration in jail or detention in a 
 reformatory, but not so guiltless or well environed but that his 
 departure, unguarded and technically vindicated, left a burden on 
 the mind of the Judge. What he could and did do is very aptly 
 expressed by Dr. C. R. Henderson, always in the forefront in the 
 study of the sociology of the delinquent group: "An old proverb 
 ran thus: 'God could not be everywhere, so he made mothers.' 
 The judge cannot be everywhere, so he must have probation 
 officers." 
 
 The child is "paroled," released on probation usually for an 
 indefinite period, with the understanding that good conduct will 
 end in his release from probation and the oversight of the Court, 
 
 i Charities, Jan. 7, 1905, p. 331. 
 
THE PROBATION SYSTEM 45 
 
 and that failure to behave properly will make him liable to return 
 to the Court and to final disposition of his case just as if he had 
 not been paroled. 
 
 2. Probation Officers. The probation officer, of supreme 
 worth in the system of child-saving, has had to justify himself. 
 At first there was seldom a way made for his appointment, and the 
 public purse-strings are still closely drawn against him. Even 
 Illinois, leader in many respects in the affairs of juvenile delin- 
 quents, does not yet pay him as such. The mayor of Chicago 
 details policemen to this duty and the city pays them as police- 
 men. There are also volunteers and still others paid by philan- 
 thropic organizations. In a few States his appointment is manda- 
 tory and in a few he is paid from the public treasury. In more 
 States no provision whatever is made for his appointment. Others 
 leave it optional. Office is held ordinarily during the pleasure of 
 the appointing body. Often the Court appoints, sometimes the 
 governor does so. In Colorado the appointee must be approved 
 by the State Board of Charities and Corrections. 2 All this un- 
 certainty indicates clearly that we are yet in the experimental 
 stage in this matter, at least in the public mind. It is true that 
 many of the best friends of the system have opposed payment of 
 officers from the public funds on the ground that the qualities 
 necessary in the officers are rarely found in politically dependent 
 men. The same argument would apply with identical strength 
 against the employment of policemen as probation officers. There 
 is basis for this argument certainly in our American public life, 
 but on the other hand this particular movement has not only 
 succeeded in keeping itself from the hands of the spoilsmen, but it 
 has been in actual development and will be in the nature of the 
 case close to the healthy censorship of individual and institutional 
 interest. Therefore, while we may be sceptical about the wisdom 
 of optimistically trusting public officials even in this high task, 
 can we afford not to encourage by decent remuneration the many 
 who voluntarily serve such a cause? They are enough so that 
 among them we may surely find splendidly equipped probation 
 officers. When we have once confessed to ourselves that the only 
 real problem is to keep the political buzzards away from us, we 
 shall find a way to do it. If we cannot check them in the Colo- 
 rado plan of requiring the approval of the charities organization to 
 the appointment, surely with the backing there is in this popular 
 enterprise we may safeguard ourselves in some other way. At 
 least let us not be guilty of listening to those who insist that we 
 cannot afford to pay probation officers. It does not require an 
 expert accountant, as Judge Lindsey and others have shown us in 
 their reports of the enormous saving of the Court to the State, to 
 convince us that we can afford from that source alone to pay more 
 officers than we need to perform the present functions of the office. 
 
 2 "Charities," Jan. 7, 1905, gives a complete list to date of appointing power, terms of 
 appointment, compensation, term of service and scope of powers according to States. 
 
46 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 3. The School and Probation. The great majority of the 
 States which have probation laws are Northern States which have 
 compulsory education laws, making it necessary for the children to 
 attend school up to about the age which is the higher limit of 
 Juvenile Court jurisdiction. This fact alone suggests the close 
 relation between the Juvenile Court and the School. 
 
 During the year ending April 30, 1904, there were heard in the 
 Juvenile Court of St. Louis 815 cases of delinquents. Missouri 
 has no compulsory education law. Of these 815 only 174 were 
 attending school! Of the remaining 641 only 222 were at work. 
 The problem of St. Louis in its child-saving is with the 419, more 
 than 50 per cent, who were neither at school nor at work. Rather 
 might it not be said that if the laws which make such conditions 
 impossible elsewhere were in force there, probably about 50 per 
 cent, of the problem would disappear. It may easily be seen that 
 the relation of the Court and the schools cannot be very close in 
 St. Louis. During approximately the same year, that ending 
 December 31, 1903, Chicago had in its Juvenile Court 1817 delin- 
 quent cases, the great majority 14 years of age or under and the 
 greater part of all of them coming under the Illinois compulsory 
 education law. 589 of these were paroled to probation officers, 
 whose primary source of information concerning those in school 
 were the teacher and the school record. The officers visited the 
 schools and consulted with the teachers, or received from time to 
 time reports and records from them information which was of 
 course invaluable both to the officers and the Judge, if the case 
 came to his attention again. It is to be hoped that usually the 
 teacher was doubly interested in the cause of the children on the 
 appearance of the danger signal given by the Court. Together 
 they may have a double reading of the barometer which responds 
 to every indication of the threatening cloud of crime. 
 
 4. The Church and Probation. Judge Lindsey's opinion of 
 the matter is worth quoting. He writes from Denver: 
 
 "The churches have given us their moral support, which is of 
 great importance and has been encouraging and helpful to those 
 who have done the work. As for direct assistance or any practical 
 co-operation with the churches there has been practically none. 
 At the present time some of the churches are taking hold of the 
 club work and opening their churches to the boys. The churches 
 and pastors have shown the kindest feeling and disposition and 
 are anxious to help the court, but the difficulty has been to devise 
 any system to harness this willing material in such a way as to 
 receive from it practical advantage. This is something to be 
 worked out and we are trying to do it through the Juvenile 
 Improvement Association. It has been rather a lack of method 
 than any lack of disposition on the part of the churches that ha? 
 prevented us from crediting the churches with any more direct 
 work in our behalf. The church women rallied to our support at 
 election time." 
 
THE PROBATION. SYSTEM 47 
 
 "Willing material" is a phrase which, when used to accompany 
 a confession of this sort, stands as a challenge. It is hardly to be 
 expected of the church that it shall work out the problems of all 
 the institutions to which it is willing to furnish "material." But 
 it is expected to be in working, practical sympathy with such 
 great, thoroughly Christian movements as this. 
 
 5. The Home and Probation. The probation officer has a 
 two-fold character. He is a representative of the law, the great 
 
 power of the State, yet he is a representative of it in its parental 
 function. If indeed he must not be all things to all men (and 
 women too in this case!) he must surely be these two things in his 
 relation to the family. More frequently than not the family has 
 contributed to the child's delinquency because of some laxity of 
 parental control, some misfortune in its organization or some 
 looseness of living. Just what the situation is the probation officer 
 must in some manner determine and his procedure must be framed 
 with that in view. In the home he must be proof against deceit, 
 gentle with weakness and firm with evil. He is clothed with 
 authority, for is he not the Judge stepped down from his bench 
 and into the life of those whom he serves? When one notes in 
 the hearing of the child before the Court how final is the word of 
 the officer to the Judge, one feels how important is the office. He 
 gets closer than any other to the whole problem of the child's 
 salvation, and if he advises that the parents are unfit to retain 
 custody of the child, usually the child is taken from them. If, on 
 the other hand, he with quick intuition assigns the delinquency to 
 some condition easily remedied here in the home with parents, 
 child, officer and Judge co-operating, he has inaugurated a change 
 that no other agency could so wisely direct. Visits to the home, 
 talks with the father and mother and with the child, sympathy, 
 counsel of patience and love in the matter of child-training with 
 these means he may make himself a respected brother and parent 
 to many a family where nothing else is needed. It is the proba- 
 tion officer's first business to know the home life of the children in 
 whom he is interested. In addition to the direct and invaluable 
 service rendered through this relation, there is an absolutely in- 
 estimable advantage in having thus added to our great force of 
 social workers a body of men and women who in the years just 
 ahead of us can out of their vast experience lay down foundation 
 principles and upon them build up a structure for child-saving 
 which shall cause us to wonder at our former lack of understand- 
 ing. The half of the story of juvenile delinquency could never be 
 told us without the probation officer and his studies of the home. 
 Those States where only sufficient officers are provided to do the 
 accounting of the enterprise or receive reports once a week from 
 the children in their offices, never or seldom visiting the home, 
 have no probation system. 
 
 6. Some Methods in the Probation System. We glorify the 
 man in time of battle between two great men-of-war, down in the 
 
48 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 deep lungs of his ship, sweltering, frantically working that she 
 may breathe and live, knowing that at any moment she may be 
 blown into pieces or sunk with her men strangling like rats in a 
 trap. But what do we know about it? A magazine has published 
 pictures of the engines and the hold and the men, and there are 
 statistics about the amount of coal consumed. We have been on 
 board such a vessel. That, with the picture which our imagina- 
 tion makes of it is about all we can know of it. We can get 
 about as near as that to the working of the probation system. 
 Numbers, records, pictures, stories, comedy, tragedy, childhood, 
 crime and success! And yet there goes with it all the final at- 
 traction to myriad lives it is child-saving! If we may get closer 
 to it we are willing to take many details and facts at second hand. 
 
 For the apprehension, the hearing and the disposition of the 
 case of the child, there are various blanks to be filled out contain- 
 ing the necessary information in regular form, f But most interest- 
 ing of all is the history sheet or memorandum made out by the 
 probation officers for the use of the Court, containing information 
 bearing upon the child's parentage, his health, his economic, his 
 educational and his moral interests, the domestic life, and all con- 
 ditions which may enter into full consideration of the case. This 
 history sheet is of the greatest value not only to those who deal 
 immediately with the child, but to those who have an interest in 
 the general problems of juvenile delinquency. Unfortunately, 
 they have not been made up with this larger purpose in view and 
 they have been as a rule badly kept. More and more we shall go 
 to such first hand statistics for our generalizations. The ideal 
 history sheet is yet to come. 
 
 It not infrequently develops that delinquency would have been 
 prevented by employment. Then the probation officer's duty is 
 clear: he should insist that the child be employed, and if no one 
 else is interested he should make it a part of his service to find 
 employment. The Denver Juvenile Court is really an extensive 
 employment agency. Many of the boys are employed in the beet 
 fields in the beet season, and incidentally work is found for many 
 others, there as elsewhere, nearly always with splendid results. 
 The moral support afforded by the knowledge that someone is 
 watching and encouraging is sufficient to keep many a lad at 
 work who otherwise would prefer to do almost anything else. 
 Judge Lindsey of the Juvenile Court of Denver has alluded to the 
 juvenile law proper, the compulsory education law and the child 
 labor law as a "trinity of laws" in close co-operation. Really the 
 Juvenile Court through its probation system and its close relation 
 with the schools and child-saving institutions, is a great factor in 
 protecting the children from abuse in the industrial system, where 
 abuse seems so easy. As a matter of fact there is little that serves 
 to limit the powers and possibilities of the probation system ex- 
 cept the lack of efficient men to play the parent to the child. 
 There is no limit to the parent's interest and his ability to guide 
 
THE PROBATION SYSTEM 49 
 
 the child, and this system is deeply and fundamentally parental. 
 
 There is a field of effort already entered by probation officers 
 which seems to offer place for the many spirits inclined to help 
 unfortunate children, applying energy and talent which has here- 
 tofore done a like service in the settlement and in the church and 
 the mission, namely the field of club life. The boy belongs to a 
 "gang" about as naturally as he belongs to the family, and at a 
 certain age is more enthusiastic about the former than the latter. 
 Boys are brought into the Court in gangs and for faults which are 
 traceable directly to the fact of such association. A few wise 
 officers have turned the gang spirit to good use. Judge Lindsey 
 has succeeded so well that with the aid of his crowds of boys he 
 has been enabled to stop lawlessness that the police could not 
 touch, has used the boys to detect crime and delinquency, and has 
 had more than 200 voluntary delinquents, boys who because of 
 their faith in his being "square wit' de kids," have confessed their 
 faults at the suggestion of other boys in the gangs, and been 
 started on the right path. He writes of the Juvenile Improvement 
 Association, a voluntary auxiliary of the Juvenile Court: 3 
 
 "This association is also * * * engineering three or four boys' 
 clubs in those parts of the city where they are most needed. In 
 such neighborhoods it has supplied baseball suits for baseball 
 nines, and exacts in return the promise of the boys in that neigh- 
 borhood to enforce the law. Some of this work is largely experi- 
 mental, but so far gives promise of eminent justification." 
 
 Mr. McManaman, chief probation officer of the Chicago Court, 
 has established a club of homeless boys taken from the John 
 Worthy School or from the Court, furnishing board at a nominal 
 cost and keeping an eye on the savings of the boys, on their health 
 and their work. He has little trouble in finding employment for 
 his boys, frequently numbering thirty. This feature is capable of 
 almost limitless extension provided the leaders can be found. 
 
 Furthermore, the models are already in existence for classes, 
 excursions, etc., which will work quite as well among the paroled 
 delinquents as among any others. There comes a place always 
 where a judge or a probation officer is at the limit of his possibil- 
 ities for the simple reason that he is but one and there are many in 
 his flock, restless, full of life and energy and always looking for 
 new occupation. It is quite natural that he should have looked 
 upon these established methods as his own; they were born out of 
 conditions similar to those he faces. But he cannot be omni- 
 present. Perhaps as the judge creates the probation officer be- 
 cause he cannot be everywhere, this officer must ally with himself 
 the large forces of "willing material" about him. The problem 
 truly is the working out of methods which shall harness together 
 the men and women of social spirit. We may find ourselves at 
 the end of our fine spurt in dealing with juvenile delinquents, and 
 unable to proceed until our forces are thus augmented. 
 
 3 "T/ie Problem of the Children," p. 133, 1904. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 CHILD-SAVING INSTITUTIONS AND THE JUVENILE COURT 
 
 The Juvenile Court found waiting for it a large heritage in the 
 way of institutions committed to child-saving, institutions char- 
 itable, religious (denominational), industrial, reformatory, truant; 
 institutions established by individuals, by civic bodies, by societies, 
 each ordinarily for some small class of children, but all having 
 essentially the same aim, the rescue of juveniles from peril and 
 misfortune. The larger number of these are private in control, 
 but in recent years many State institutions have sprung up as a 
 concession to the growing sentiment which forbade the assignment 
 of juveniles to jails or even to reformatories. It was a recognition, 
 too, of the fact that a great number of delinquents were such 
 because they had been deprived of fitting parental oversight. 
 Such institutions were founded in the hope that through them this 
 want might be filled. But as a rule they are not at all adequate. 
 
 For example, during the year 1903, of the 1586 delinquent boys 
 of the Chicago Juvenile Court, 717 or nearly half of them were 
 sent to the John Worthy School. But this is a "part of the city 
 bridewell;" it is a prison, as Judge Tuthill of the Juvenile Court 
 has said. It is too crowded to permit sufficiently long residence 
 in each case to accomplish what it dught, which is a very common 
 complaint. The "St. Charles Home for Boys" which is being 
 erected on about 1000 acres of the finest farm land in Illinois, with 
 an initial appropriation from the State of $325,000 for buildings 
 and $50,000 for maintenance, will help greatly. Private benevo- 
 lence furnished the first $100,000. 
 
 St. Louis is calling for an Industrial School. At present she is 
 sending children to an institution organized as "a penal institu- 
 tion, reformatory and asylum * * * which achieves none of its 
 objects satisfactorily." 1 State Industrial Schools are depended 
 upon more than any other institutions. It is difficult to make 
 these institutions seem parental in any real sense; parents are not 
 institutions. This is the real problem of child-saving. Children 
 need parents, and the system that furnishes the best substitute 
 will be the -most successful system. But until we get more proba- 
 tion officers helping the child while he is yet permitted to live at 
 home, we shall have to depend on institutions. During the year 
 (1903) when Chicago sent 717 boys to the John Worthy School, 
 224 were sent to the Parental School and only 564 were paroled to 
 officers. 2 The Buffalo Court has paroled over 50 per cent, of its 
 children to probation officers. 3 
 
 1 Children's Courts in the United States, Barrows, p. 164. 
 
 2 Juvenile Court Record, Jan. 1904, p. 5. 
 
 3 Children's Courts in the United States, Barrows, p. 14, 1904, 
 
 50 
 
NIVERSITY I 
 
 as^X 
 
 CHILD-SAVING INSTITUTIONS AND THE "JUVENILE COURT 51 
 
 We are in that state of affairs in regard to our child-saving 
 institutions inevitable to our complete disorganization of method. 
 Our efforts have been partial, spasmodic, isolated; there has been 
 , no unifying theory nor practice. No plan has been devised which 
 covers the whole field, bringing to the attention of some single 
 body all the delinquents and all the dependents. To such a state 
 we are looking, and when we reach it we shall easily and natur- 
 ally fall into consistency with regard to our institutions. We shalj 
 need them less because we are leaving behind the institutional idea 
 as too impersonal, but the institutions which sulvive will not need- 
 lessly duplicate in either function nor expense, and will be closely 
 related both by whatever theory underlies our treatment of juvenile 
 delinquents and by whatever method is central to the whole system. 
 
PART IV 
 
 CRITIQUE OF PRINCIPLES, MEANS AND METHODS 
 
 SUMMARY 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 PRINCIPLES DRAWN FROM EXPERIENCE 
 
 Thus, always feeling the imperative of protest against anti- 
 quated and pitifully inadequate methods and principles, impelled 
 by really scientific studies of child nature, and the effects of city 
 life and environment upon it, following close upon every sugges- 
 tion of institutions that constituted the vanguard, passing all too 
 gradually from the ground of vengeance as a means of protection 
 and control to that of punishment, then pinning its faith upon 
 reformation, only to finally recognize that prevention would avoid 
 much of the problem altogether, ever calling more earnestly for the 
 mediation of all its methods and principles through intelligent and 
 consecrated men and women, there has slowly emerged and shaped 
 itself a more or less elaborate, disorganized apparatus for the 
 study and treatment of juvenile delinquents. Its friends are con- 
 scious of not having apprehended; they are in the * 'press forward" 
 stage. Private initiative is in the lead. The legal mind has been 
 softened and enthused as the standard of education for the legal 
 profession has advanced. Concessions without number have been 
 made in procedure and principle to delinquent childhood. Agita- 
 tion has made many friends and advocates. Spoilsmen have been 
 steadily and persistently invited to forget that this might be a field 
 for politics. Best of all the State has been invoked in its parental 
 function. To be sure it has regularly betrayed its awkwardness 
 and inexperience, as a parent, but with thousands of delinquents 
 born every year into the courts and other institutions there is little 
 fear that the State, now fully conscious of its parenthood, will not 
 learn and succeed. 
 
 In any fair description of the machinery of the modern juvenile 
 delinquent system, especially if it were written as a comparative 
 study having in mind the stages of development, one might read 
 between the lines and find that it is constructed to do a different 
 task and furnished with different motive power than the machinery 
 formerly given the task of grinding out the criminal grist. But it 
 has been as impossible not to follow more or less closely the old 
 mechanism as it would be not to find much of the printing press 
 of 1885 incorporated into the press of 1905. An entirely new 
 development of either could not be expected. Yet we have been 
 unduly conservative, have held too close to the criminal procedure 
 throughout. At many points we understand child life better than 
 ever before, and our understanding is not half reflected in our 
 apparatus. The school, the church, the home have learned much 
 
 55 
 
56 ' TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 concerning him in recent years. Medical science has contributed 
 no small share. 'But it is not all brought together and appreciated. 
 If it were we should not be following so closely upon criminal 
 procedure in " the case of .the delinquents. Our principles must 
 grow Out of <our experience; our experience grows only by small 
 additions to that point where it is possible to generalize anew, to 
 seek new directions with confidence. In recent years the strides 
 have been long and many, we have dared to experiment, we have 
 enjoyed comparing notes. Anyone who fully appreciates the mag- 
 nitude of the matter hesitates to predict for the immediate future 
 much more than a continuance of the experimental work, confident 
 that after all our understanding warrants it. Careful criticism is 
 due at every point, and we are assured that it will be forthcoming 
 in such spirit as will profit us much. But let the warning note be 
 again and again sounded that we are not yet building even the 
 framework; we are making up the specifications. Interest is deep, 
 many of the forces, enlisted are strong, the problem is^stupendous. 
 We must be content to move slowly and cautiously. Our best 
 advance has served to define the group which we call the juvenile 
 delinquent group, and that is surely half the battle. 
 
 The particular value of, our historical study of the child, his 
 delinquency, its nature, causes and treatment, his standing in the 
 group as reflected in laws and other apparatus for conforming him 
 to its will, is not so much in the description of how the delinquent 
 child is and has been treated, as in the possibility of revealing 
 elementary principles, safe working directions in which. to rest 
 assured of the sanity and effectiveness of criticism, extension, 
 elimination,, initiative in method. We thus confess our ifidebted- 
 ness, not only to the careful student of child psychology and 
 physiology, but to the Greeks and the Barbarians of yesterday and 
 today, who have experimented and blundered and succeeded, but 
 at least have furnished us with points of departure. 
 
 It is of value to us certainly to have recognized that we have 
 many factors to deal with, demanding co-operation, that the child 
 himself is the greatest factor, that what the group expects of the 
 child is a determining feature, and this in itself is a variant. We 
 have found that the standard of the" primitive group is simple, 
 following lines of instinctive action. That is good which furthers 
 the simple ends of the group, and that bad which defeats them- 
 The standard is much the same for the individual, the family and 
 the tribe. The stimulations to conformity are usually as simple as 
 kinship and direct economic need. The agencies promoting con- 
 formity are in the child's earlier years the family, and later the 
 tribe, with the transition usually marked by some sort of initiatory 
 ceremonies. 
 
 In the more advanced group it is a far more difficult thing to 
 determine what is good or bad. With the complexity of group 
 activity the standard to which conformity is demanded becomes 
 less simple, and' that conformity is urged and enforced by legal 
 
PRINCIPLES DRAWN FROM EXPERIENCE 57 
 
 formulations, more or less artificial and arbitrary. The family is 
 the agent insisting upon conformity and, too, through a more pro- 
 longed period of infancy, while at the same time the larger group 
 formally through laws, education and perhaps religion, . and in- 
 formally through public opinion as expressed in patriotism, poli- 
 tics, etc., seeks to prevent delinquency. Difficulty creeps in wher- 
 ever the interests of the family actually or seemingly cease to be 
 identical with those of the community^or nation, and this condition, 
 together with the inability of the larger group to intelligently deal 
 with the delinquent child, is to be looked upon as the source of 
 our unending uncertainty and fault. Both family and state have 
 tremendous responsibility which must be roughly formulated and 
 well understood. The child is a member of both; each is his 
 guardian. The relation is real and close. Ideally, state must be 
 essentially family,- and family of that character which makes it 
 possible for men to dwell together in the numbers and the life 
 necessary in the state, before the child can enter with any assur- 
 ance of happiness and successful outcome upon his training which 
 looks to his conformity to a complex ideal under the direction of 
 atieast these t\yo teachers. 
 
 [_The stale finds itself confronted withthe, task of holding Jbefore 
 the child, who has already felt the ffitflflrmife^ r$i^ttten~yieldmg 
 his will to the members of his, own family, thC necessity of further 
 considering every member of the state as having equal rights with 
 him. It is the same lesson that he has learned in the family, but 
 it does not seem the same. The state is impersonal; he is not 
 interested in its Agents. The state insists that he shall not be 
 delinquent. First it does this indirectly through the parent. The 
 parent has learned the lesson and now hands it along. If he fails, 
 the state asserts its parental function by taking his place and 
 declaring him irresponsible. Then directly, by means of the law 
 in its corrective and punitive function, by the schools, by variously 
 so fitting and environing him that the total of his life activities and 
 interests, may tend towards harmony with the group standard, it 
 demands conformity. 
 
 "At the same time the state is called upon to recognize_the__lo-Sg_ 
 ties of the family as an ideal relation which it may not hope to 
 attain to, but of which it must take account and approximate as 
 nearly as possible. It must, furthermore, look to the nature of the 
 child. He is not a criminal ordinarily, no matter how serious his 
 departure from the path laid out for him. He is not an adult in 
 understanding nor in judgment. It should recognize him as sub- 
 ject for the same sort of thing that it has learned to accord him in 
 its function as educator in those things calculated to positively 
 'equip him for his place in the state, namely formative, directive 
 influences... He is the same being the state seduces into effective 
 citizenship by the attractiveness of the schoolroom; it must still be 
 seducer when he makes a mistake. 
 
 Again, and quite as important, the state must take account of 
 
58 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 the fallible, partial, derived nature of its laws as an expression or 
 even as a guardian of group morality. Its "laws" are a reflector 
 of average group morality and through them it is a schoolmaster 
 to the child. Its duty is never to get away from the sense of the 
 general, final power always resident in the people of the group. 
 Put into other form, the less the legislative, judicial and police 
 powers of the state are used merely negatively, and the more they 
 are mediated educatively, on the truer basis we shall be. The law 
 should certainly be more than our policeman. We have a right to 
 ask today that it shall be our schoolmaster. And when a more 
 ideal day arrives, when teachers shall have been better trained to a 
 larger task, shall have merited such distinction by attracting chil- 
 dren away from delinquency, we may hope to turn the caption 
 about and declare that the schoolmaster is our law. 
 
 One more principle is fundamental. It would be impossible to 
 discover any advance in the treatment of juvenile delinquents 
 which had not been inspired by some interested and observing 
 individual and then enlisted to itself others among the few who are 
 free to fight the battles of the children. Without champions, the 
 cause has faltered and mistakes been perpetuated. Invariably, as 
 it has attracted them, it has been furthered. Ergo, if the state 
 hopes to continually elevate its standard and expects conformity 
 thereto, it must free a vastly larger body of its members to the 
 task. The social spirit is gaining ground popularly, and the at- 
 testation of this fact lies both in the devotion of splendid lives to 
 the uplifting of the unfortunate of every condition and the training 
 of such workers in our academic circles. The state has one plain 
 duty, namely to make such financial provision for those fully 
 trained that men and women most desired in the service of juve- 
 nile delinquents may not fear to devote themselves exclusively, 
 professionally to that service. This is a first principle, and its 
 neglect is the gauntlet lying nearest us among the many we have 
 not dared to take up. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF THE LAW AS A FACTOR IN THE TREATMENT 
 OF JUVENILE DELINQUENCY 
 
 It is a short step from principles to means and methods. 
 Once granting that our point of departure is the nature of the 
 child and the significance of his delinquency to his life and there- 
 fore to the social body of which he is a part, one meets the neces- 
 sity of reviewing the apparatus which has dealt with him in order 
 to judge whether it has taken account of the principles gradually 
 evolving from our experience. Juvenile delinquency renders its 
 account first to the law of the realm. Is that law adequate to the 
 situation? What is its essential nature? Shall it reflect only the 1 
 experience of yesterday? Or shall it be in spirit leader and 
 initiator? Shall it in any manner experiment with the situation? 
 The relation of law and delinquency is a matter which bids fair to 
 concern revolution in law quite as much as to settle specific prob- 
 lems of delinquent childhood. 
 
 Pollock (1) says that law is the sum of the rules necessary to 
 permit men to live together in harmony. Yet law has always been 
 on a war basis; it has been a protective, regulative thing, a police 
 power, even when it has risen above the dignity of vengeance or 
 repression. Customs, based on utility or not based on utility, 
 have become fixed into law. The earlier we start in the process 
 the smaller the group of persons in whose interest the law is 
 formulated. In the Homeric stories it was the king, with the 
 strange mythical partner, Themis or fate, constituting a sort of 
 primitive ''divine right of kings;" in the Athenian State it was an 
 oligarchy; and a final form is the fixed code or constitution with a 
 larger legislative and judicial body. 
 
 The development is slow and comparative. "The jurispru- 
 dence of one age is history in a later." 2 "We must alternately 
 consult history and existing theories of legislation." 3 And through 
 it all the central thing has been, in criminal law, indeed in all law 
 of persons, the act and its effect upon the community, whether trie 
 spirit was that of vengeance, repression or reform, rather than the 
 person, and the person as a member of the social whole. 4 
 
 Law is an ethical thing in not the highest sense. It stands 
 upon a certain eminence and looks back over the field of human 
 
 1 First Book of Jurisprudence, p. u. 
 
 2 Alfred Russell, "T/?e Police Power of 1he State," 1900. 
 
 3 O. W. Holmes, Jr., "Common Law," 1887. 
 
 4 See American Journal of Sociology, Jan. 1899, p. 523. "Criminal Anthropology and 
 Jurisprudence," by Frances A. Kellor. 
 
 59 
 
60 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 experience and generalizes, seeking a basis of harmony. "By far 
 the greater part of our law has been and is developed by the 
 judges, the jurists and the bar, and the greater part of our law has 
 been developed after men have acted and in determining the effect 
 of their actions." Legislative enactment "setting out rules of con- 
 duct to be observed subsequently is in reality the least important 
 method of law making." 5 
 
 It is not largely an ethical thing in its operation. The judicial 
 arm is called upon to pass a free judgment only when the legisla- 
 tive will is silent, and the legislative will seems obliged to take 
 account of precedent in its enactment to an extent that is damag- 
 ing to the ethical sense. Dillon (6) says that "ethical considera- 
 tions are generally the foundation or animating principle" of enact- 
 ment. The lawyer's business is to "inform rather than to invent, 
 to be accurate rather than original; to chronicle the decisions of 
 c others, not his own desires; to illumine paths already trodden * * 
 and in fine, to emblazon that-long list of judicial precedents through 
 which our Anglo-Saxon freedom 'broadens slowly down.'" 7 On 
 its eminence law remains, -as an observer and chronicler, with a 
 broader vision as experience. widens before it, always on a war 
 basis. The result is a morality as high as is demanded by the 
 legislator and not impossible to the worst, but probably never in 
 many points even a decent compromise between best and worst. 
 It is "the embodied conscience of the political community" as 
 Mr. Warville says in his "Legal Ethics," (8) and in many 
 political communities necessarily very fallible as an expression 
 or guardian of the ideal group morality or even the real group 
 morality. 
 
 But in the meantime the extra-legal ethical expressions of the 
 relations of man to man, especially relations of children and the 
 group, have gone on under the influence of psychological interest 
 ,and investigation. The individual as over against the group has 
 taken a new place. The former is a part of the latter, not only in 
 respect to his duties and responsibilities, over against which are 
 set penalties, but he is a part of the group in his whole make-up, 
 physical, mental and moral. The group duties and responsibilities 
 come into view. The group asks itself what it owes to and may 
 reasonably expect from its members, and the question is an ethical 
 "open-sesame," throwing no small light on the individual as a 
 being physically, mentally and morally conditioned by the group. 
 As a result of this new attitude laws of domestic relations "have 
 felt the softening influences of modern civilization. The common- 
 law doctrine of parent and child finds its most important modifica- 
 tion in the gradual admission of the mother to something like an 
 equal share of parental authority; in the growth of popular systems 
 of education for the young; in the enlarged opportunities of earn- 
 
 5 Russell, "Police Power of the State," p. 10. 
 
 6 Storr's Yale lectures, 1891-2. '%'aws and Jurisprudence in England and America." 
 
 7 Schouler, "Domestic Relations," 5th ed., p. 21. 8 P. 17. 
 
SPIRIT OF LAW IN TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENCY 61 
 
 ing a livelihood afforded to the children of idle and dissolute 
 parents; and in the lessened misfortunes of bastard offspring. 
 Guardian and ward, a relation of little importance up to Black- 
 stone's day, has rapidly developed since into a permanent and 
 well-regulated system * * * and much of the old learning on this 
 branch of the law has become rubbish for the antiquary. The law 
 of Infancy remains comparatively unchanged." 9 
 
 Theoretical Ethics is departed from its war basis, with the selfv 
 assertion of its Egoism, the self-suppression of its Determinism, 
 the truce and- compromise of its Prudentialism, its "computed 
 expediency," and has come to peace, to self-sacrifice in its idealism. 
 In its train have gone psychology and pedagogy and to a large ex- 
 tent even Criminal Anthropology. Why should not Jurisprudence 
 follow also, especially in its law of persons? The evidences just 
 read are but the slightest indication of its intention. There is 
 other evidence, however, in the movement centering about the 
 Juvenile Court, insofar as it is disposed to recognize the well- 
 accepted facts concerning the nature of the adolescent youth. 
 
 It is interesting and profitable to note the source of the existing 
 juvenile law reform. It came from the psychologists, the educa- 
 tors, the theorists, the students of children otherwhere than in the 
 courts. It was irresistible because it was true. It is one of the 
 most splendid instances in all legislation that the people are the 
 law, that there is nothing inherent in the nature of the law that 
 prevents it from entering into its inheritance of moral right in 
 some form, and that assigns to it the exercise of police power only, 
 forbidding it to become in any real sense a formulator of peace 
 measures in the interests of childhood. Pollock says, (10) "Law 
 cannot enforce all moral rules, but may sometimes react on the 
 moral standards * * * It may even elevate the standard of cur- 
 rent morality." Indeed it may elevate the standard of morality, 
 and what institution is in better position, or is in possession of 
 more actual experience out of which to raise a standard? 
 
 This last fundamental generalization is by no means a maxim 
 in jurisprudence; it is anything but that. The facts that have 
 made possible the entering wedge in the treatment of juvenile 
 delinquents could all have been gathered by the agents of the law, 
 and were observed by them, yet what action has been taken was 
 under strong protest from administrators of the law in many quar- 
 ters and resented as the dreams of dilletantism. 
 
 Yet there is serious disadvantage in having those outside the 
 legislative and judicial and administrative machinery the only ad- 
 vocates of ethical peace. It means a double standard, hostility of 
 forces, waste of energy and expense, relegating to individual initia- 
 tive and institutional (private) care what should be public interest. 
 The law is in such position, in its actual contact with the juvenile 
 delinquent, observation of his life, environment, training, etc., 
 
 9 Schouler's "Domestic Relations," 5th ed., pp. 20-21. 
 10 "First Book of Jurisprudence," 46ff. 
 
62 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE, DELINQUENTS 
 
 that no other c^n so well 'judge of the nature of a child's delin- 
 quency. Here is a v child subject for -educational treatment in 
 accordance with another ethical standard and another pedagogical 
 apparatus, in the hands of an institution whose ethical decalog 
 has been written in characters of repression, correction or at best 
 reformation. Let it be so; here lies the suggestion of our juvenile 
 salvation. The law is its own best student, critic, observer, legis- 
 lator. It is the institution that is ^observing the delinquent mem- 
 bers of the community, after some act has given them the warning. 
 It is also the institution that, using its understanding of this class, 
 should turn its attention, guided by the new principle underlying 
 the law, to the prevention of delinquency. Here is a part of the 
 juvenile world that is waiting in earnest expectation for the reveal- 
 ing of common sense. 
 
 The traditional place of the law is in the courts, dealing with 
 the exceptions, with the rebels or the ignorant or the careless. 
 Therefore we have difficulty in recognizing it when in and out of 
 the court-room it commits itself to dealing with incipient or threat- 
 ened delinquency or to the actual prevention of it. But is it not 
 the name law that punishes truancy and makes possible the school? 
 Is it not the same public spirit which stands behind the school- 
 teacher and the judge. Is it not the same end that they seek? 
 Again, that the courts have been dealing- with adults and criminals 
 until the spirit of vengeance and repression and reformation pre- 
 vails, making it difficult for the officials when placed in charge of 
 the children's courts to get away from that spirit into a more fit- 
 ting one. The law as it operates in the children's courts and in 
 the maintenance of the public schools is the same thing, and should 
 be actuated by one spirit. These two are among the greatest 
 public agencies for dealing with the child, and many children still 
 slip through into delinquency of a serious nature. More is due to 
 the development of the children than these agencies now afford. 
 Some supplementary measures, some extension of function there 
 must be, call them preventive or educational as we may. Now if 
 the law as it operates in the children's courts can be seen to be 
 the same thing as that in the public school I believe that these 
 supplementary agencies may better be a part of the court than of 
 the school, because the court is, by its historical position and atti- 
 tude, looking for delinquency while-the school expects conformity. 
 Let the instruction of the public as to conditions in the commu- 
 nity threatening delinquency be a function of the children's court. 
 Let the records of bad housing and over-crowding and bad streets 
 and poor sanitation and lack of playgrounds and ignoring of laws 
 of labor and all the defects which actually contribute to delin- 
 quency, and which may be remedied by the community, be her- 
 alded abroad by the court. Let the agitation centre here. Let 
 the remedial measures in the form of clubs and night schools and 
 employment bureaus and giving of aid and the hundred other 
 things that are undertaken by the outsiders, become legal things. 
 
SPIRIT OF LAW IN TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENCY 63 
 
 Make it possible for Judge Lindsey to do his work as Judge Lind- 
 sey and not as a philanthropic bachelor who does as a "father" to 
 the boys what he is not permitted to do as Judge. 
 
 The protest comes that the law in the form of the children's 
 court would be little other than an experiment station thus. But 
 the schools have done some very profitable experimenting for the 
 child, and at the same time have retained their disciplinary power. 
 Why not so with the courts? The agents of the law are not qual- 
 ified to do such work? It is not the formal agents of the law in 
 any but exceptional cases that are doing the work of the children's 
 courts anyway. There are plenty of individuals and institutions 
 willing enough to see their work organized permanently in the 
 extended functioning of the court, and content, furthermore, to see 
 the law in the business of elevating the standard of the group 
 through any means, even though it depart from traditional paths. 
 
 Thus the law, one expression of the voice of the group, is 
 challenged to a fresh study of the child, to a new approach to the 
 matter of juvenile delinquency. It is asked to become an agent in 
 the formative process in accordance with the principles above 
 formulated. Judging from results already attained, the form which 
 the growing understanding of the matter will take will be more 
 laws specifically aimed to make permanent the claims of those 
 who have been closest students of child nature, and displacing in- 
 adequate and unfit laws, especially those relating the juvenile 
 delinquent to the criminal. The legal judgment passed upon him 
 will be different from that of the criminal more uniformly than 
 now, and will be reached by a more direct path. In our legal 
 conservatism we have hesitated to go very far from the well- 
 beaten way. A firm grasp on the spirit and meaning of the law is 
 bound to make us fearless and independent. Other directions of 
 juvenile law reform will take account of two chief relations of the 
 child, the home and the school ties, resulting on one hand in vastly 
 closer co-operation between the court and the school, and on the 
 other in a surprisingly extended exercise of the parental function 
 of the state over the parents. So long has it been thought that the 
 only exercise of this power possible was in taking the place of the 
 parent when he failed with the child that we have not been well 
 prepared for the paradox presented in the state turning adviser to 
 and guardian of the parent, doing through the parent as proxy 
 what it learned from the parent. That feeling of responsibility 
 which is or should be instinctive with the parent, growing into 
 great proportions as the possibilities of the life of the child are 
 measured, is a thing of reason to the state. One plain direction 
 of juvenile law reform will be the reasoned quickening by the state 
 of the failing instinct of the parent. 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 THE FUNCTION OF THE COURT AND THE PROBATION SYSTEM 
 
 The friends of the children's court are rapidly generalizing 
 their experiences. A branch of the criminal system in its origin, 
 it has now entered into an estate of its own, in many cases practi- 
 cally independent. In its constitution and procedure it necessarily 
 much resembles its ancient parent, but this much may now be 
 said, that in general it is already looked upon as a legalized child- 
 saving institution, correcting delinquency and preventing crime. 
 What it should be is a legalized child-stutfymg and child-forming in- 
 stitution, as far as possible preventing delinquency. There is no 
 doubt that as the years go on it will be more and more an inde- 
 pendent organization, free to extend as it sees best, carrying over 
 nothing from the law, which will always stand behind it, except 
 its sanction of power, and through its experience exercising a reflex 
 influence on the law in its spirit and letter. If the child is ever 
 father of the man, we shall see that case here, with the juvenile 
 delinquent court teaching its well-learned lessons to the criminal 
 court. 
 
 Nothing is contributing to its thorough emancipation and its 
 effectiveness so much as the interest and consecration of its friends. 
 What would not yield to that!. Let it be kept from the moth and 
 the rust of politics and ' 'graft" and it cannot fail to exercise a 
 tremendous influence upon future national life. It has its positive 
 tasks. It must agitate. It must experiment. It must demand 
 funds of the municipality for the care of the child when necessary. 
 It must press the duty of equipping and maintaining the best men 
 and women who can thus be drawn into its service. It must legal- 
 ize its powers over parents and children powers that seem absurd 
 to those who are accustomed to appeal to the state for the exercise 
 of individual freedom. Law is the only means to freedom, as it 
 has been the only means to protection and as it shall be the only 
 means of development and education of many of our powers. 
 The court must remain a legal thing, but with powers and oppor- 
 tunities commonly not associated with the formal concept of law. 
 Its problems, beyond those suggested, will solve themselves as its 
 place is fixed and its guiding principles formulated. More than 
 specific suggestions concerning advance, we need full understand- 
 ing of the principles underlying our procedure. These are just 
 beginning to appear, and to be formulated. 
 
 He who said that the judge was the "centre" of the juvenile 
 court system spoke the truth. But he can be only "centre" in 
 
 64 
 
FUNCTION OF THE COURT AND THE PROBATION SYSTEM 65 
 
 himself alone. The probation officer is the radius, and to him is 
 left the task of determining by the length of his service to the 
 child where shall be drawn the circumference which measures the 
 total influence of the system. The judge alone touches the child 
 at one point. The probation officer, and through him the judge, 
 has as many points of contact with him as he will. In this simple 
 analogy appears the whole matter of probation. Shall it be simply 
 an administrative arm of the court \ Shall the probation officer be 
 only a clerk or at most a lawyer to investigate and plead the case? 
 Shall the judge create the officer 'and limit or define his place? Or 
 shall the task make the man? Upon the answers to these ques- 
 tions, worked out in the next -few years of experience, depends the 
 sphere of the probation officer, and more, the meaning of probation. 
 
 Already many cases are investigated and dismissed by proba- 
 tion officers without having a hearing before the judge. Already 
 officers extend the radius of their influence and power beyond what 
 is required by the judge and the law, and do it because there is 
 need that it be done. Already latitude is given the officers by 
 intelligent judges which amounts to an extensive guardianship 
 over the child, over the parents, over the school life and the work 
 life of the paroled delinquent. The life of many an officer, is an 
 incarnation of the gospel of contact. He determines how long a 
 period his active influence shall cover, how real and how practical 
 shall be the help he renders, how little he shall be an officer of the 
 law and how much an interested companion and adviser. 
 
 But the radius of action is usually much too limited. Officers 
 have not had opportunity to imbibe the broad social spirit that 
 actuates the best service. They are not trained to observe condi- 
 tions that cause delinquency. The apparatus calculated to insure 
 honest, effective effort in behalf of delinquency is slow in the 
 making. It must wait for experience in many fields, and for 
 experienced and sane teachers. It must wait for public sympathy 
 and public support. Again, it is condemned to wait for public 
 indifference to pass away. Like all good enterprises, it must wait 
 long after it has begun to deserve a hearing. 
 
 The probation system is bound to present a fine example of the 
 fact that we must eternally move backward towards an ideal but 
 never-to-be-reached point where prevention may properly begin. 
 We prevent crime by taking the delinquent in hand. We prevent 
 delinquency by educational methods, especially by such methods 
 as will interest the child in line with his instinctive action. He is 
 a playing animal; he is a constructor, an actor. Therefore we are 
 beginning to let him play and build and effect things. The pro- 
 bation system must find itself in methods far back in the line of 
 prevention, hand in hand with other educational methods where 
 possible, and in spirit pregnant with this view of the matter. 
 There is nothing inconsistent in the notion of a probation officer 
 being a policeman in one instance or at one time and a teacher 
 and leader in another, unless it lies in the narrow and too special 
 
66 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 interpretation of both functions. Finding its beginning in the 
 desire to prevent, its experience has at many points taught it that 
 a prime way to prevent is to use the child's interest and powers. 
 The boy who steals, perhaps does it because he has no work by 
 which to earn and buy. The boy who is incorrigible probably 
 would as easily spend his over-abundant energies in work that was 
 attractive. Thus the officer finds it necessary to be fundamentally 
 two things, policeman and teacher or leader. He must be these 
 things whether the case gets to the court or not. If he is to suc- 
 ceed he must extend his office and anticipate legal action, especial- 
 ly in connection with the school, the truant officer and the home. 
 He mingles with the folk of the community. Better than almost 
 anyone else he knows its pulse and its life if his territory be small 
 enough. He sees more than the policeman and more than the 
 teacher, because he is looking for more. To a great many he may 
 be more important than either. Do we in our eagerness exalt the 
 office of the probation officer? Surely not when we consider that 
 the comparatively few he has to deal with are the very ones whose 
 salvation to good life is of the moment of life and death to the 
 community. Surely, too, we thus exalt him as he is, but not as he 
 has opportunity to be. The greatest service that can now be 
 rendered to probation is the opening up of its possibilities to those 
 who, consecrated but somewhat untrained, have enlisted and do 
 their tasks as well as possible, but who feel themselves handi- 
 capped and checked by lack of thorough knowledge of conditions, 
 by the narrowly legal view of their office, and by the fact that 
 theirs is a pioneer field. Every officer could double his service by 
 assuring himself that in pioneering one is not held to beaten paths, 
 and by further assuring himself that he does not do half his duty 
 unless he possesses his country as unexplored land and in an 
 unhampered, unlimited, spirited answering of the call of juvenile 
 delinquency for the satisfaction of needs that neither delinquents 
 nor their guardians fully know. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 WHERE THE JUVENILE DELINQUENT RANKS ARE RECRUITED 
 IN ST. LOUIS; SUGGESTIONS FROM A PARTICULAR STUDY 
 
 There is fair chance today to view the world from which the 
 ranks of the juvenile delinquents are recruited. Such a view opens 
 retrospectively into conditions and causes, and at the same time 
 reveals the problems of the future with some solutions. Less each 
 year it is necessary to guess and experiment with delinquents; 
 more and more does our experience shape itself into confidence in 
 dealing with the situation. A bit of experience from the city of 
 St. Louis is instructive. The law establishing the juvenile court 
 there was approved March 23, 1903, and went into effect immedi- 
 ately. The number of cases examined is not very large, the 
 records are not completely kept, the force employed is altogether 
 inadequate, the atmosphere is more than in many courts that of 
 the criminal court, but the experience is uniform month after 
 month, and presents in general the same aspects to be observed 
 elsewhere. 
 
 /. The Recruiting of the Ranks. Through the courtesy of the 
 probation officers, who are making a good fight for their charges, 
 the records of many months were thrown open for examination, 
 and several hundred cases closely considered. The records of ten 
 years hence will be a veritable mine in comparison with this survey 
 of the surface. A few localities furnish the great numbers of delin- 
 quents. Conditions in those localities are such that delinquency 
 may be expected. The situation presents no mysteries. Care 
 was taken to weigh any unusual circumstances which would not 
 ordinarily be duplicated. The results are worth our while. Of 
 one group of 200 delinquents, so selected that arrests at all seasons 
 of the year were represented, a certain 5 of the 12 police districts 
 contributed 74 per cent. The same .districts claimed 65 per cent, 
 of another 200, and throughout the records these five districts are 
 seen to have manufactured delinquents and turned them over to 
 the juvenile court in entirely disproportionate numbers. This 
 furnished the basis of extended inquiry. Next it was necessary to 
 learn whether the delinquents arrested in these districts, namely 
 Nos. 2, 3, 4, 5, and Central, lived in the districts in which they 
 were arrested, or lived elsewhere, and made these their 'hang-out." 
 Central Police District is that which embraces the main business 
 streets of the city, extending in length back from the Mississippi 
 River twenty-four blocks, being about half as wide as long. Dis- 
 
 67 
 
68 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 tricts 4 and 5 lie to the north and 2 and 3 to the south of Central 
 District, all being skirted by the River, quite thickly populated, 
 with little park space, poorly built up in the residence sections, 
 and with dirt}', crowded streets. It is not strange that they con- 
 tribute so large a share of delinquents. 
 
 The place of arrest is important. If large numbers are arrested 
 in one locality, the presumption is that there is a sore ppot in city 
 juvenile life. The investigation proved that the nearer the centre 
 of the city where conditions are hostile to clean living, the greater 
 the number of arrests, or in other words, other things being equal, 
 the greater the liability to delinquency on the part of the children. 
 From all parts of the city they flock to this section. District 2 is 
 a large district, and the larger part of it is a considerable distance 
 from the real hot-bed of delinquency. Only 5 per cent, of those 
 arrested in that district out of a considerable number lived outside 
 that district, that is, found "hang-outs" away from home. 95 per 
 cent, were arrested in their own district, and the number was not 
 abnormal, considering the unfavorable conditions. In District 3 
 8.7 per cent, were from the outlying districts, this being a bit 
 nearer the centre of the city. District 5 contributed a large share 
 to the total and 21 per cent, had drifted in, to be arrested in Dis- 
 trict 5 "hang-outs." A still larger number came from without to 
 District 4, over 18 per cent, not residing there. More than 30 per 
 cent, of all the arrests in the city came from Central District, and 
 Gl per cent, of these did not reside there. These figures are essen- 
 tially duplicated in the total experience of the court. The nearer 
 the evil and confusion and looseness of the centre of the city, the 
 more delinquency, and the increase is evidently not the nat- 
 ural accompaniment of boy and girl life, but is the accompaniment 
 of the life of those particular districts where life is worst. In 
 absolute numbers the most guilty are Central and Nos. 4 and 5, 
 the second of these presenting conditions that are particularly dis- 
 graceful. A study of this district is very enlightening, if we use 
 the juvenile court figures as a basis, then examine the locality, and 
 finally grasp the causal relations, poverty, miserable accommoda- 
 tions of life, lack of opportunity on one side, and failure, delin- 
 quency and crime on the other. The Open Air Playgrounds Com- 
 mittee of the Civic Improvement League, in its report of 1903, 
 analyzes the lower half of this district, nearest the River, includ- 
 ing in the analysis a small part of District No. 5, which part is of 
 far higher average than the portion of District No. 4 described. 
 But taking the inventory of the whole section the following is 
 the equipment for manufacturing delinquents: 
 
 92 blocks and a population of 30,000, among them Negroes, Russian 
 Jews, Germans, Irish, Poles, Italians, Syrians and Roumanians. 
 7 blocks have a density of more than 300 people per acre. 
 2T, " " " " " from 200 to " " " " 
 
 28 " " " " " " TOO " 200 " " " 
 
 12 " " " 50 " loo 
 
 22 " " " " . . " less than 50 people per acre, but are 
 
SUGGESTIONS FROM A PARTICULAR STUDY 69 
 
 used almost entirely by foundries, factories, lumber yards, stores, 
 warehouses, railroads. 
 
 The largest actual density is 656 people per acre. 
 
 The average for the city is less than 50 people per acre. 
 
 There are no parks, and very little play space is available. 
 
 The enrollment of the schools for the year 1902-1903 was 4159. 
 
 No compulsory education law. 
 
 Nearly all streets unpaved. 
 
 Street cars on every street north and south. 
 
 Street cars on all but two streets east and west. 
 
 Three schoolhouses with no adequate playgrounds. 
 
 In this district we also find 5 Jewish, 6 Catholic and 18 Protes- 
 tant churches and missions, but what is needed is not churches, 
 but places for the outlet of youthful spirits. The committee re- 
 ports, "if the schools were provided with adequate spaces for 
 playgrounds, open after school hours, during the school year, and 
 open throughout the summer vacation, a material reduction of 
 juvenile arrests would follow." It hardly seems necessary to add 
 that the same result would follow if the life indoors were more 
 attractive, if the houses were well built and roomy, with back and 
 front yards for play spaces. The houses are built flush with the 
 walks. The children are driven to the streets and the delinquen- 
 cies are those of the street, such as ball-playing, "flipping" cars, 
 "crap-shooting," petty stealing, fighting, gang organization and 
 depredation. 
 
 2. The FaAs Ensemble in the Records. It is as easy to fix 
 the responsibility as it is unpleasant to some to have it so fixed. 
 With this particular locality in mind it may be profitable to sug- 
 gest in detail such organization of forces and such procedure as 
 would lay the situation open to all interested and demand action 
 from whom action is due. First of all the facts must be known, 
 and must be known ensemble; the whole picture must appear at 
 once. There is much value in the cartoon method, which calls for 
 but a glance to convey the idea. No less important is it that the 
 whole predicament of the juvenile delinquent be portrayed in a 
 carefully formulated record, or at least that to a few minds it be 
 declared by as many records as may be necessary. It should be 
 known and advertised, for the story is so tragic and so needless 
 that its recital and portrayal is its best argument. 
 
 The present records are too exclusively history sheets of the 
 case in hand, of use only to the probation officer and the judge, 
 and too little calculated to serve the larger purpose of making 
 those very records to a large extent unnecessary. It is a natural 
 error. But if the records were such that every entry condemned 
 someone besides the child and justly so, laying bare someone's 
 fault, the very clerks who registered them would cry out against 
 the wrong. It is the repeated generation of such feeling that 
 spells reform. It is not enough that the child's address, age, place 
 of birth, parentage, occupation of self and parents, nationality and 
 creed of all, members of family, name and address of employer, 
 name of school-teacher be given. The majority of these things 
 
70 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 have little to do with his delinquency, and not always much to do 
 with his salvation. The causes are easier to get at than they seem. 
 The data mentioned above are usually given with a fair degree of 
 accuracy and are in some cases valuable. But the matters calling 
 for most attention are slighted, the officer does not care or does 
 not have time to ascartain the truth and cannot depend on the child 
 to report correctly. The ecclesiastical connections of the child 
 and family are important in that certain forces there may be called 
 in to investigate the case further and to contribute largely in the 
 reformation or help of the child. The names of employer and 
 teacher mean nothing on the records, but consultation with them 
 and enlistment of them in the campaign means much. It is prob- 
 ably a fact that very generally these things are neglected. Cer- 
 tainly it has been so in the writer's knowledge of the matter. 
 
 In the St. Louis records there is a caption, "Social Environ- 
 ments," and the entry is usually, "Five rooms," "One room," 
 "Bad," or other vague and uninspiring record, and as long as 
 there are no more officers to relieve the over-burdened and help- 
 less strugglers this most important factor will be much neglected. 
 Of one group of 200 cases what few figures were given showed that 
 the average number of rooms per family was 3.21. The result is 
 valueless. The figures are incomplete, some of the children had 
 no rooms to live in at all, and the number in the families was not 
 given. It certainly happens often that two rooms for one family 
 would be better than eight for another. But if it were possible to 
 keep these statistics completely it might be shown that a certain 
 district were overcrowded shamefully, that the law was being 
 violated, that the large part of the blame for delinquency lay at 
 the feet of the landlords. If so, a thousand probation officers 
 would be of little service, while a bit of reform which might be 
 brought about in six months or less might change the face of the 
 situation. Again, the condition of the streets and alleys might be 
 serious, the play spaces inadequate or absent. If so, one need go 
 no farther in search of causes of delinquency. The educational 
 opportunities might be poor, the police force small or corrupt, the 
 neighborhood flooded with criminals and criminal resorts. The 
 probation officer would be helpless. 
 
 In all this we have halt presumed that the probation officer is 
 not merely to deal with the particular cases paroled to him, but is 
 a sponsor of the juvenile life of the community. That he is not at 
 present, but will be, and without being policeman. He cannot 
 afford longer to needlessly spend his energies reforming and watch- 
 ing after the trouble has begun, and raise no hand or voice in pro- 
 test against the continued presence of causes. He is not the sort 
 of individual surely who would gladly see the grist coming in 
 simply because he held a position in the mill. We cannot pre- 
 sume that the juvenile court in its records is to constitute the 
 statistical department of the city. But we do insist that a thor- 
 ough grip on the situation presupposes the existence of such 
 
SUGGESTIONS FROM A PARTICULAR STUDY 71 
 
 statistical department, and the full use of it by the court and the 
 probation officers not only in dealing with the children, but in 
 dealing with the community at large in the effort to make it see its 
 responsibility. The probation officer and the court have no right 
 not to be reformers! The first step in reform is education educa- 
 tion to the facts. It would be a great service to any city if the 
 statistical department should be centralized, and statistics of 
 health, tenements, streets, population, education, recreation, em- 
 ployment, industry, moral and religious forces be so easy of access 
 and combination that at any time a community might have placed 
 before it a cartoon of itself that might be suddenly shown to be not 
 a cartoon, but an actual likeness. Do moral conditions wait upon 
 dry statistics? Yes, but the figures are clothed with life! The 
 task that is waiting to be done is the gathering together of the 
 facts and turning them into a propaganda. The Civic Improve- 
 ment Leagues are undertaking the task in some cities. It must be 
 done now with the Juvenile Court as the point of departure. The 
 Juvenile Court will live by giving life. 
 
 * 3. The Task of the Schools. Invariably the records of a 
 juvenile court furnish evidence that the child has not been drawn 
 out, educated, trained properly. The family comes in for the first 
 and largest share of the blame, and then the school is proven 
 guilty. It would be presumptuous and unfitting to here propose a 
 curriculum better suited than that in vogue to save the child from 
 delinquency. The best will always be open to the charge of being 
 unrelated to the life that the child will enter after his school days, 
 and the charge will be unjust in proportion as the purpose of edu- 
 cation is misunderstood. The school cannot afford to make its 
 sole end the production and turning out of finished engineers, 
 carpenters, ministers or lawyers; to be a man is vastly more impor- 
 tant, to be upright, considerate of all things and all men, to be an 
 effective servant to the highest welfare of the community. Yet the 
 life of the delinquent is a call for certain things. 
 
 a. Compulsory Education. It goes without contention that 
 education should be compulsory. The records of such a court as 
 that at St. Louis, where of one year's grist only 21 per cent, were 
 in school, are sufficient argument except in localities where for one 
 reason or another ignorance is courted. 
 
 b. Moral Training. Evidently the most important element 
 in education for the prevention of delinquency, is proper moral 
 training. The child who is schooled to fear the consequences of a 
 wrong decision, to turn decidedly upon the wrong as soon as it is 
 detected, as Christ turned upon the protest of Peter that he need 
 not go to the contemplated lengths of sacrifice, is the child who 
 will at once avoid delinquency and be best fitted to meet the trust 
 that modern life gives into his hands. The result will be failure 
 where Rooseveltian fearlessness of consequences of decision is not 
 found. The teacher is a poor teacher who fails here. The ques- 
 tion of moral instruction is not one to be consigned to the ethical 
 
*72 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 faddist. The curriculum in the ordinary school is already crowded, 
 and seems to preclude the possibility of introducing a department 
 of ethical instruction. Nor would it be desirable. Deep moral 
 lessons may be taught in every department, from spelling to math- 
 ematics. Especially do literature and history lend themselves to 
 the making of moral children. The principal desideratum is that 
 teachers shall be conscious of the necessity of opening the way 
 everywhere for right decisions. The child should not find it neces- 
 sary to go through a long course of reasoning, laboriously weigh- 
 ing the elements, in order to decide a question. In most matters 
 he should be able to take his stand instantly. Certainly when he 
 has come to the point where his mind is settled, his will should be 
 immediately set in motion. 
 
 The teacher of history has the splendid opportunity of leading 
 the pupils through time, making over again the decisions of the 
 ages, analyzing errors, p.ositing results that would follow from 
 various possible courses, coloring all with a high morality. There 
 could not be written that text book on history which would not be 
 a great laboratory in practical ethics, fine practice in the business 
 of making right decisions. The same is true of literature, from 
 the most serious to the least. How deep the lessons in Burns' 
 "To a Mouse," and "To a Daisy;" in Wordsworth's "To a Fly;" 
 in Eugene Field, in Stevenson, in Dickens, in all the Romantic 
 School, to say nothing of the purpose novels of Kingsley! And 
 these with a thousand others are entirely in line with the regular 
 work of the teacher. The instructor must understand that the 
 child's life demands that history and literature and all the other 
 subjects are to be presented not merely as things of beauty or 
 entertainment or material profit, but always as a part of real life 
 and especially for the accumulation in the child's life of experi- 
 ences not unlike those gained elsewhere and which by analogy 
 shall help him. So commonplace does such advice seem that it is 
 necessary to appeal to its neglect to give it force. The Ethical 
 Culture School of New York has begun to show the possibilities. 
 Thoughtful teachers everywhere have touched the borders of this 
 land. Normal schools have a responsible task in making the 
 teacher consciously a teacher and leader in juvenile morality. 
 The whole matter is worthy of extended treatment with the records 
 of the juvenile courts as a basis and inspiration for the task. 
 
 c. Civic Instruction. Instruction in matters civic is another 
 thing to be urged in the light of our experience with delinquents. 
 To understand his relation to his fellows and his duty in a specific 
 case is the first essential for the child, yet often enough all this 
 takes the form of his relation to the community. A fair acquaint- 
 ance with the ways of the city and the state, the duties of officials, 
 the value of life and property, the rights of men with men, will 
 prevent much evil that the child now walks into only half con- 
 scious of infringement. Instruction in civics is very incidental in 
 the ordinary school. Here is a field for special organizations with- 
 
SUGGESTIONS FROM A PARTICULAR STUDY 73 
 
 in the schools something after the plan of the George Junior 
 Republic in procedure. The time-honored debating society could 
 do no better than to devote the wrangling propensities of the youth 
 concerned to the learning of the life of the city and the duties of 
 the officials, disguised under the form of the various city depart- 
 ments. Thus the child could learn without knowing that he was 
 learning all the possible relations he might sustain to the com- 
 munity which stands ready on small provocation to pronounce him 
 delinquent. 
 
 d. Manual and Religious Training. The bearing of manual 
 and religious training is patent, and these matters will soon be 
 placed on a good working basis in the schools. So large is the 
 discussion of these matters that their relation to delinquency is 
 here indicated by only a word. 
 
 4. Parks, Playgrounds, Vacation Schools and Settlements. 
 Just as we look for moths in the spare rooms, where they have 
 opportunity to work unmolested, we look to the spare time of our 
 youth for much of the delinquency that is only the result of inac- 
 tivity. This fact has been one of the chief arguments leading to 
 the establishment of vacation schools, parks and playgrounds. 
 All these give place for the normal expression of the child's life, 
 and in the first and last his energies are carefully directed so that 
 his pleasure becomes also his direct profit. When placed where 
 most needed, the vacation schools and playgrounds without any 
 question have saved many a child from delinquency and many a 
 delinquent from crime. Their worth is incalculable, and they are 
 being appreciated to the extent that back of them stand scores of 
 supporters and agitators. But the parks and boulevards are usual- 
 ly lacking in the crowded districts which contribute most to the 
 courts. 1. The settlements with their various features, clubs, 
 gymnasia, baths, playgrounds, employment bureaus, and most of 
 all their consecrated and competent resident sharing in their every- 
 day lite, have done valiant service. They have insisted on clean 
 community life and clean individual life. 
 
 5. The Place of the Library and the Librarian. There are 
 facilities in a well equipped library which have not been fully used. 
 A good juvenile department is always popular, irrespective of the 
 condition of the children of the locality. The children can find 
 many books which are almost as real to them as real life, and will 
 occupy their time with a good book in those very moments when 
 their sheer restlessness makes them uneasy and reckless. The 
 juvenile book world is a veritable mine today, and the department 
 calls for those adapted and trained for the service they may render. 
 An adept not only knows the literature, but knows the boy, and 
 invariably a good choice on her part invites the repetition of the 
 child's confidence in her judgment. He may be introduced to a 
 new world in every book. His mind maybe filled with riches that 
 he can command all his life. His moments may be rescued from 
 
 i T. J. Riley, "The Higher Life of Chicago, 11 p. 14, 1904. 
 
74 TREATMENT OF JUVENILE DELINQUENTS 
 
 worse than idleness and a genuine contribution made to his life 
 equipment. It is a splendid field for one who has the instincts of 
 the teacher, the playmate and the book lover. 
 
 Less than a year ago a librarian in a large city library was ap- 
 proached by a worker in the juvenile department who had all the 
 qualifications, education, interest to direct the reading of the 
 crowds of boys who came to the library, many of whom had been 
 in the juvenile court for delinquency. She wished to give her time 
 during the whole afternoon to a closer contact with the boys, di- 
 recting their reading, learning more of their live? that she might 
 better know their needs, reading to groups of the younger ones and 
 in general putting the means of the department at the disposal of 
 the children. The opportunity was to do a great service, to es- 
 tablish in the juvenile department a movement which should be 
 the ideal for every city library, to render to the city world of youth 
 a help that it may long wait for. But every one on the force was 
 needed to do clerical work ! The funds were low ! And at that 
 very moment one highest up in the force of "clerical" workers was 
 embezzling the funds of the library had been doing so for years 
 unwatched ! The plan was not for a moment considered. What 
 a splendid opportunity the juvenile department of a large library 
 offers in behalf of delinquent and threatened children. Honor to 
 the library furnishing funds and talent to this work ! 
 
 6. Civic Improvement Leagues. It has been sufficiently in- 
 dicated that juvenile delinquency has many causes. If the evil is 
 remedied there must be many changes in the environment of the 
 youth. The task is manifold and the forces must correspond. 
 The time has come for the establishment of a clearing-house in 
 every city for the betterment of the city in every respect, and of 
 such an establishment the juvenile court can make the greatest 
 use. Many such bodies come into existence as Improvement 
 Leagues whose prime interest is the promotion of the beauty and 
 cleanliness of the city. Others make for clean politics. Both are 
 of benefit to childhood. It is now suggested that such organiza- 
 tions enrich their purpose and extend their efforts by having more 
 consciously in view the improvement of childhood. The Civic Im- 
 provement League of St. Louis has committees on the press, legis- 
 lation, open air play grounds, free baths, waste paper boxes, pub- 
 lic sanitation, vacant lots, statuary, junior horticultural farm and 
 school gardens, tree planting, wide tires, water purification, sub- 
 urban improvement, signs and sign boards, historic tablets, street 
 naming, tenement houses, pure milk, also a ladies' sanitary com- 
 mittee, membership and general committees. There is, of course, 
 the possibility of change and addition and expansion indefinite. A 
 Civic Improvement League enlists those most closely and really in- 
 terested in improvement, and enlists them as volunteers. When 
 open to facts and actual conditions such persons can exercise the 
 healthiest censorship over officials who are inclined to get away 
 from the notion of the public good. They learn of conditions hid- 
 
SUGGESTIONS FROM A PARTICULAR STUDY 75 
 
 den and ugly, they agitate, they enlist followers, they publish con- 
 ditions, they keep the standard of official action high, they act 
 privately, legally, publicly. For many years the men and women 
 of social spirit have known that there were other fields than the 
 church for their efforts. The result has been the settlement, the 
 organized bureau of charities, the voters' leagues, and a hundred 
 other forms. The systematic organization of the moral forces of 
 the community is as inevitable as the organization of labor. The 
 result will be more action, cleaner cities, more accurate knowledge 
 of facts, dissemination of those facts, higher ideals and achieve- 
 ment of them. It is just this that the youth of the city need. The 
 result will be shown in the records of the courts. Civic Improve- 
 ment Leagues must be the order of the future, accomplishing 
 through private interest what public interest is powerless to ac- 
 complish. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. . 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 '' The centuries have brought the state to the fore. Its 
 will is the dominant will. But there is no state except the ag- 
 gregate of individuals brought to their united best through the 
 years of experience. It is not an arbitrary thing existing for itself. 
 Its great and only task is the insurance of the good of its members. 
 It is protector of rights and guardian of happiness. For these 
 purposes it has formulated laws, ever closing in upon its members, 
 restricting individual actien in certain spheres, but by denning 
 rights, making men free./JChe early laws took little account of the 
 rights of children, the family being sponsor for them. But in re- 
 cent years more account of the children has been taken. They 
 are legally persons, and therefore have rights. But beyond all 
 this, the state has taken it upon itself to give all its members equal 
 chance of life and happiness. In the case of the children it does 
 this by insisting that they receive their due heritage of family train- 
 ing and instruction and help, whether it comes from the family or 
 from the state in its parental function. 
 
 It is in connection with the exercise of this power by the state 
 with the delinquent group that our problems rise. / Legal delin- 
 quency is but an incident, often an accident. But in the main it 
 is inevitable when certain conditions exist which do exist general- 
 ly, especially in our cities. The duty of the state, therefore, is 
 with those various conditions. It is surely not sufficient to punish 
 the delinquent child. We are beginning to believe that the state 
 does not perform its duty even in reformation of the delinquent. 
 It must prevent, and it must go to such lengths in prevention that 
 it is the same state, operating in the same spirit, that cares for the 
 child in the school, in the street, in the playground, in the factory, 
 in the court and in the home. It cannot afford to wait for the for- 
 mal declaration of delinquency; it must anticipate, ward off. It 
 must yet learn to forget the delinquent of the court and the proba- 
 tion office and start back with the child yet too young to come in 
 contact with the world in many places, yes, even plan now for gen- 
 erations of the future. It must learn to idealize to the extent of 
 thinking of every child as a possible delinquent before it may dream 
 of every chil^as an acceptable member of society, and lay its plans 
 accordingly. 
 
 76 
 
CONCLUSION 77 
 
 It is not too much to insist again that where prisons and re- 
 formatories and courts have stood there shall be homes, schools, 
 institutions of a hundred sorts, all under the state's eye and care, 
 all marking its entrance into parenthood. And the men and the 
 women through whom this office is mediated, if they be not the of- 
 ficers to whom are committed the care of streets, schools, play- 
 grounds, tenements and all the forms which gather up the interests 
 of the people, must be the interested, the reformers, the volunteer 
 fathers and mothers. After all, they are the state quite as much 
 as the police or the judges, each one a prophet of the day when 
 government shall be parental in spirit and in the best sense, each a 
 prophet of the day when the state shall seek for its servants and 
 mediators the Rooseveltian men and women, the spirits able to 
 look upon the veriest arab and rag-a-muffin and dream dreams and 
 see visions of an upright and effective citizen. Today the call is 
 for such. It is the line of the skirmish that is to be occupied; the 
 main army is not yet recruited. It is hoped that this glance back 
 over the country will reveal some things not seen as we have ad- 
 vanced, that the plea that the state do its work as a state rather 
 than in its few leaders, may be heard, further, may not the state 
 feel its burden of responsibility over every child who is delinquent 
 or may be delinquent? Our reconnoitering wilj soon yield many 
 plans of campaign. We can continually gain^more vantage points, 
 open up new territory, fortify previous occupations, and hear ever 
 the call to further unselfish, undiscouraged service in the battle for 
 childhood. 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY 
 FORM NO. DD6 BERKELEY, CA 94720 
 
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