A BILL FOR AN ORDINANCE TO ESTABLISH A Section 1. There is hereby established a House of Detention in the city and county of Denver for the purpose of caring for dependent or delinquent children sixteen years of age or under, whom it may be necessary to incarcerate or hold in custody by virtue of the order, warrant or direction of any court of the city and county of Denver, or an arrest by any officer thereof. Section 2. Until a building is erected therefor, the House of Detention shall consist of a suitable and convenient house, to be rented or leased for not to exceed five years for any one period, upon such terms as may be approved by the city council. The House of Detention shall be so arranged, furnished and conducted that, as near as practicable for their safe custody, the inmates thereof shall be cared for as in a family home and public school. To this end the employes provided for and selected to control and manage such house shall consist of a man and woman who are husband and wife, of good moral character, who shall be respectively designated at "Superintendent" and "Matron" of the House of Detention, and shall reside therein, and at least one of whom shall be competent to teach and instruct children in branches of education similar to those embraced in the curriculum of the public schools of the said city and county up to and including the eighth grade, and such help or assistance as in the opinion of the city council shall be necessary to the proper care and mantenance of such house. Such house shall be supplied with all necessary and convenient facilities for the care of the inmates as herein provided. Section 3. The superintendent and matron shall be designated and appointed by the mayor of the city and county of Denver, to serve while satisfactory to the mayor, and shall jointly receive a salary of $1,200.00 per year, payable in monthly installments of $100.00. All other necessary employes for the conduct, care and maintenance of said house shall be selected, named and appointed by the mayor, upon such salary as shall be fixed and approved by the city council. The supplies or repairs necessary to maintain, operate and conduct the House of Detention shall be furnished upon, the requisition of its superintendent to the commissioner of supplies, and the bills therefor shall be audited, passed upon and paid as other bills for supplies for the institutions of said city and county of Denver. Section 4. It shall be the duty of the superintendent of said House of Detention to keep a complete record of all children committed thereto, which record shall contain the name, residence, address and age of each child, and the cause or reason of its detention, the length of time detained, the offense alleged to have been committed by such child, if any, and any other useful data or information that may be directed to be kept by the judge of the Juvenile court of the city and county of Denver. A record shall also be kept by such superintendent of all expenditures made by the city for the care and maintenance of such home. An annual report to the city council shall be made between the first and thirtyfirst days of December in each year by the superintendent, which shall contain an itemized statement of all such expenses necessary to maintain such house, together with the number of inmates therein during each month. The city council, or the judge of the Juvenile court of said city and county, may, at any time, demand, in which case it shall be the duty of the superintendent to furnish, such information as said city council or court may require concerning the conduct, maintenance or inmates of the House of Detention. Section 5. There is hereby appropriated from the emergency fund, created by Ordinance No. 32, of the series of 1903, the sum of six thousand and five hundred dollars ($6,500), to be placed to the credit of the House of Detention fund, for the purpose of maintaining and conducting the said House of Detention and caring for its inmates for the year 1903. February 6th, 1904, the charter convention, provided by the constitution of the state of Colorado, to adopt a new charter for the city of Denver, established as part of the county government a "department of charities and correc This department is maintained by a commission of three citizens, appointed by the mayor, which has supervision over all the charitable and correctional work of the city. The ordinance referred to, and section 120 of the new city charter, were adopted in pursuance of the general statutes concerning delinquent children, which statutes abolished the jail and provided for a detention school. The section of the new city charter is as follows: "Section 120. There shall be established and maintained a detention school, not connected with any jail, which shall be in charge of a superintendent. The superintendent shall be appointed by the juvenile court (county court) of the city and county, provided such appointment must be first submitted to the commission for its approval as to the qualification of the appointee. It shall be the duty of the commission to approve or disapprove such appointment within thirty days after the submission thereof; such appointment shall be considered approved in case the commission shall fail within said time to take any action thereon. The superintendent must be qualified to instruct and teach children in branches of education similar to those of the public schools of the city and county. Such schools shall be supplied with all necessary teachers, help and convenient facilities for the care of inmates thereof. The employes thereof shall be appointed in like manner as the superintendent. Children under sixteen years of age, arrested for any cause, may, by order of the juvenile court, unless otherwise provided by the juvenile court act, be held in the detention school until final judgment. They shall receive schooling and professional services when required. No child fourteen years of age or under shall be incarcerated in any common jail or lock-up. "The superintendent shall keep a record of such children. and such other information as may be required by the juvenile court (the county court) of the city and county, or the commission." The ordinance and section of the charter were written by the judge of the Juvenile court of Denver. In the original ordinance the city council changed section 3 so as to provide that the mayor should make the appointment of the superintendent and matron of the detention house or school. This was done primarily because it was desired that some one of the political faith of the administration passing the ordinance might be apointed, but the mayor appointed the selection of the Juvenile court and turned down politicians. As the ordinance originally read it provided that the judge of the Juvenile court should make the appointment. In the section of the charter referred to it is provided that such appointments shall be made by the judge of the Juvenile court, but the appointment must be submitted to the commission of charities and corrections for its approval as to the qualifications of the appointee. This commission receives no salary and is made up of prominent citizens interested in philanthropic and charitable work, and who, because of the fact that the position is purely an honorable one without any compensation, are not likely to be politicians looking principally for jobs and helping to get others jobs and thinking of nothing beyond a job. So that this provision was written with the hope that the superintendent of the detention school would be a first-class teacher, whose competency would be measured by ability in this respect, rather than by activity in politics. THE PHYSICIAN AND THE COURT. The provision that children in attendance should receive schooling and "professional service," was intended to preserve that feature of the administrative work of the Juvenile court of Denver, which is to send a delinquent child to an eminent specialist of the medical profession, when it seems advisable, as is often the case. Many a case of delinquency in the Juvenile court of Denver has been cured by the physician, who has discovered that weak eyes, secret habits, lack of nourishment, neglect, nervous trouble, or other physical causes are directly responsible for or contribute to the moral ailment. The Juvenile court of Denver has a regular staff of physicians, who render their services without compensation. These gentlemen of the medical profession are among the most eminent in the city. No more interesting chapter of the Juvenile court of Denver could be written than that of detailing the splendid work they have unselfishly performed in many cases and the many magnificient results," even though the diagnosis returned in many cases by the physician is "pure cussedness." When a child is detained in the detention school, the superintendent simply calls up the grammar school and ascertains the grade and studies and lessons for the day and week, and the child is put at its desk during the day at the same lessons and the same work it would otherwise be doing in school, except that it is not permitted to go out and play unless under exceptional circumstances and is detained over Saturday and Sunday, or such length of time as the court shall direct, pending the hearing or character of the case where it is necessary to discipline a probationer. The normal condition of the child is thus preserved, and while it is corrected it is also protected. The detention school is not a cure-all and sometimes seems to fail of its purpose, and while there are exceptional cases, it must be remembered that the same was true of the jail only in a greater number of cases, surrounded by greater dangers and always by evil influences which do not pertain to the detention school. The boys and girls are seperated, although accomodations are provided in the same house. It is very seldom that girls are in detention, and if so there are generally not to exceed two or three at a time in a city the size of Denver. Probably the average attendance at the detention school in the city of Denver would range from ten to twenty boys. There are accomodations in the present detention school for as many as twenty boys and six or seven girls. Denver is a city having about thirty thousand children between the ages of eight and sixteen, so that it will be observed that the number of delinquents is comparatively insignificent, but however small the number may be they are entitled to be protected from the vile influences of the jail while the city is attempting their correction. The present officers of the detention school consist of Mr. and Mrs. J. P. Wright, who are superintendent and assistant superintendent respectively. One young man is kept as guard and helper, and one cook and housekeeper, making four employes in all. The boys and girls are often required to do the housework, very much as they might be required to do in their own homes. The superintendent sleeps in the dormitory with the boys, and every effort is made to protect the purity of their lives, a thing that not only is not done in jails, but on the contrary, every feature of jail life contributes to the frightful moral degredation of children either locked up together in a room in the jail, as has been the case in many jails, or placed in the same cell or bull pen with men and women, as we have seen them in jails of other cities. THE MOST RECENT COLORADO CHILD LABOR LAW, PASSED IN FEB. 1903. It will be noted by section one (1) of the child labor law that a certain discretion as to exemption from operation of the law is vested in the county court in all cases between 14 and 16 years of age. The effect of this has been to render the law more elastic and to exempt some cases from the operatioin thereof. But for this provision the law might have worked a serious hardship. There has been no claimed abuse under the privilege of this section, and it has generally proved satisfactory. In Denver all applications of children to be permitted to be relieved from the operation of the |