displacing what was becoming a serious weakness in the juvenile court system, viz., a disposition on the part of the state to relieve the home of its responsibilities.

The answer made by every chief of police convinces us that the number of careless, negligent parents shows aneven greater increase than their delinquent offspring. This carelessness is not limited to the homes of the poor. Largely, because of poverty, it is most accentuated in such homes. The advantages of wealth save many children of the rich from the children's court. They may not be petty thieves, but debauched with wealth and selfishness they are fast becoming a dangerous element of citizenship. From this class is being recruited many of the social perverts and weaklings and the unconscionable frenzied financiers and so-called business men whose business crimes are shielded because of superior cunning or intelligence, and very often lack of law to reach them, or laws poorly enforced because of moral cowardice of officials. They prey upon the public by that kind of piracy and brigandage which seldom brings the perpetrator to the courts, but which is nevertheless doing more to undermine the Republic than all the petty thieves who come from the homes of the poor and ignorant. There are homes in which the household god is money, and the boy learns selfishness and greed. The examples furnished by the parents in such homes and the examples furnished the children of the poor by the exploitation of such men, as held up to the public in the daily press and gossiped about in the home of the people, is to my mind a most serious menace to the men of tomorrow. Every citizen of a community who through dishonest political or business methods accomplishes what seems to be a success is "doing an injury to one of these little ones" of whom he may never have heard, but for whom he is morally responsible by his very acts and conduct as a citizen. Of such a one our Master said:

"It were better that a mill stone be hanged about his neck and he be cast into the sea."

As much therefore as we are able to be congratulated upon the progress made, we are compelled to admit that some of the greatest injuries to children cannot be reached by law. I have been companionable with some of the boys in the children's court, and I have had bright boys of the street ask me questions, of which the following are fair samples:

"Judge, if So and So (referring to an official holding a prominent position entrusted with sacred public duties) can stuff the ballot box, why can't the kids play for money?"

This was the query of a newsboy who associated with a gang of crap shooters within a stone's throw of a gambling house protected by the police department, running in violation of the law and well known to these boys of the street who had often suffered the jail and degradation for doing what their elders did under the protection of their "pull" with the city government. A petty imitation of their elders made criminals of the boys, and the same crime on a larger scale made protected and even prominent citizens of the men. The great wealth they gained by crime seemed actually in some quarters to add respectability and political power to the men. It brought the policeman and his club to the boys. Another boy asked me how much money each alderman was to get for purchasing a certain site for a public building. He read in the papers of the open charges of graft against prominent citizens. Another boy once asked me if the saloon keeper let the boys in the saloon on Sunday or sold them liquor, and the policeman (whom he named familiarly) did not arrest the man, why it was the "kids could not swipe things." I have had a sixteen year old girl brought to our court for immorality, complain to me bitterly that the policeman who arrested her protected the dance hall or wine room keeper. She had no respect for the police department and saw no justice in law.

These things demonstrate that laws cannot do everything. They emphasize the responsibility of those entrusted to enforce laws. Speaking generally, children are always better than their elders. If men obeyed and enforced laws we would have no serious trouble from children.

There is much that might be said in a report of this character which the time for its delivery will not permit, and I must forego many other general observations which I would like to make. It will be noted, however, that wonderful progress is being made all over this country, especially in the last two years, in behalf of the children and the home.

A juvenile improvement association or children's aid society is getting to be a very popular feature in connection with the work of the juvenile court. Such an institution has been recently established in a number of cities as the result of the juvenile court work. In my own city of Denver, the Juvenile Improvement Association has been in existence nearly three years and during that time has accomplished much good work in improving conditions in neighborhoods by our boys' clubs, playgrounds, fresh air funds, obtaining employment and relief and in many ways assisting needy children and needy homes. This

work does not seriously encroach upon that of the charity organization society, although in some cities it may be all taken care of by the various philanthropic organizations. Indianapolis and Seattle have recently organized such an aid to the juvenile court work. If the purpose of the juvenile court is to keep children out of institutions as far as possible and correct them in the home, it is certainly in my judgment, a legitimate part of this work to aid, assist and co-operate with every movement designed to keep children out of the juvenile court.

I believe that judges of juvenile courts should not be limited to lawyers. I predict the time will come when the educator and not the lawyer in the capacity of the ordinary judge, will control the work now called the children's court.

Another encouraging feature of any juvenile court work is the probation system which co-operates with the schools It is especially a help to homes in which there is no father, the mother works, and because of misfortune discipline is lax. We realize that each particular city to a certain extent must govern its probation system by its own peculiar conditions, and what might be successful in one city would be quite impracticable, if not impossible, in another city. Large cities might be divided into district with a central headquarters in charge or a chief officer for that district, connecting by telphones and other methods of co-operation with schools and employers. In Denver, the probationers are divided into school boys and working boys. The school boys report to the Juvenile Improvement Association every two weeks with a report from their teacher showing their progress and conduct. If any one in the neighborhood of a probationer is violating any law for the protection of children and it is known to this probationer he always reports it as a part of his duty as a little citizen. The probationers are taught to overcome evil with good, not with the jail, the strap or degradation. Confidence and trust are encouraged. This has succeeded so admirably that every child sent to the Industrial School is sent alone without an officer, and not one thus trusted has ever failed to reach his destination, though it involves many temptations to escape.

As chairman of your committee, during the past winter and during the session of the legislatures, between January 15th and February 19th, I visited personally the following states: Nebraska, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, New York, New Hampshire, Ohio, and Washington City. In Washington City, I had the honor to confer with President Roosevelt concerning juvenile court laws proposed for the District of Columbia, and in which the president expressed the most intense interest. His knowledge and interest in the matter was far beyond that of all the senators and representatives or committees in the House in behalf of the children's laws. There was much more interest shown in the Senate. The Board of Children's Guardians of Washington City and Mr. McFarland, the Chief Commissioner for the District as well as local committees from the Women's Clubs did heroic work for the children's laws, but all to no purpose. They are not discouraged and will renew the fight at the next session.

I had the honor to speak to several legislatures, some in session, and to some at special meetings called by the members in behalf of children's laws. Everywhere I went, in a visit covering some twelve or fifteen large cities in nearly as many states, I found the members of the women's clubs, while all devoted to their individual homes, yet earnestly working for laws to help the homes of others. The charity organizations were of ocurse generally active.

The Visitation and Aid Society of Chicago, of which our good friend Mr. Hurley is chief sponsor, was, as he always has been, active in that original centre of juvenile court inspiration. Too much praise cannot be given the Jewish organizations, the settlement workers at Hull House and Chicago Commons for what is being accomplished in that great city. Judges Tuthill and Mack of the Chicago Juvenile Court. Mr. H. H. Hart of the Children's Aid Society of Chicago and Mr. Hurley visited Minnesota, rendering valuable service in securing the law to that

state.

I was disappointed to find that in the state of Illinois outside of Chicago the juvenile court law was being much neglected. and in some of the large cities no effort had even been made to establish a juvenile court, and children were actually suffering the degradation of the jail or going uncorrected upon the streets, notwithstanding the law is in existence in Illinois. I found some prominent officials and business men in one or two of the large cities in Illinois who seemed to be ignorant of the fact that such possibilities in the way of laws for the protection of children existed in their state. I understand, however, that this condition is being rapidly remedied.

I trust without offense I may take as a sample of the police reports which I investigated in a number of cities that of the city of Washington. It should be remembered that the officials (Continued on page 14.)

Juvenile Court Record

PUBLISHED BY THE VISITATION AND AID SOCIETY

T. D. HURLEY, President and Editor

79 Dearborn Street, Chicago, III.

Associate Editors

HON. B. B. LINDSEY, Judge, Juvenile Court
Denver, Colorado

THOMAS WALSH, Chief Clerk

New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children 297 4th Ave., New York

W. A. GARDNER, Chief Probation Officer, Juvenile Court Portland, Oregon

J. L. CLARK, Business Manager 79 Dearborn St., Chicago, III.

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EDITORIAL

WHAT CIVIL SERVICE CAN DO.

It is not infrequently alleged that the civil service examination is an unreliable method of selection-that its tests often lack point, and that the markings fail to grade actual fitness. The examination lately held by the county civil service commission for chief probation officer of the Juvenile court certainly refutes any notion that such an examination need necessarily prove illadapted for filling an office involving specialized duties.

The last legislature provided for the appointment, under the county civil service commission, of a chief probation officer of the Juvenile court. That court paroled nearly 1,400 children to its twenty-four probation officers last year, and the total number of children under the care of such officers was about 3,000. The chief probation officer is destined to have much to do, under the court, in working out the still undetermined lines of policy to be followed in the supervision of this great number of "difficult" children. His task, therefore, is obviously one requiring peculiar capacities. Realizing the importance of conducting an examination which should be thorough and discriminating, the county civil service commission appointed Judge Carter, Mr. W. D. Moulton, Justice T. D. Hurley, and Miss Jane Addams to prepare the questions and mark the papers. The committee generously undertook the task. Fifteen candidates entered the examination, and Henry W. Thurston received the highest mark.

This result appears to be one over which the commission may reasonably feel satisfaction. Prof. Thurston has been in the Chicago public school system since 1887. He knows and cares for children; he has a live interest in pedagogy; his special subject in the Normal school has been civics, and he is awake to the general social problems of the day. He should, therefore, bring to the delicate and important duties of his new position peculiar qualifications of intelligence, outlook, and sympathy. He should be able to appreciate the wayward boy, not only as a subject to be dealt with by the public school system but also as a product to some degree of bad surroundings. He should be able to see the problem of juvenile crime and delinquency-which is so much to the fore in this city at the present time -in its broader relationships, and gradually to indicate more constructive methods for dealing with it than have hitherto been adopted.

Not only the county civil service commission but the public may be properly congratulated upon another instance of discriminating choice through the machinery of the civil service examination.-Tribune.

GEORGE L. SEHON, State Superintendent.

One of the most aggressive works in childsaving is being accomplished by the Kentucky Children's Home Society, the headquarters of which are in Louisville, Ky. This Society, organized nearly ten years ago, now stands guard over an army of children, gathered throughout the length and breadth of Kentucky by its watchful agents, and its Advisory Boards are each week adding to its list of wards. That a child is destitute and unfortunate is sufficient to enlist the sympathy and aid of the Society.

In addition to caring for its own wards. the Society is ever on the alert to aid and protect innocent and defenseless children from abuses at the hands of unscrupulous persons who, believing that because an orphan is friendless, there is no one who will fight its battles for it.

The agents of the Kentucky Children's Home Society are moving about the State at all times, and are ever watchful to detect instances where friendless little ones are imposed upon, and when such an instance is found, no trouble nor expense is spared to aid the sufferer and punish to the fullest extent the person or persons guilty of the abuse. The Society's agents are instructed to take aggressive steps to protect defenseless children wherever found, whether they are wards of the Society or not, and many instances of such aid have in the past few years endeared the organization to the people of Kentucky. The Kentucky Children's Home Society not only takes under its wing the destitute children of the Commonwealth, taking them from the unwholesome environments thrown about them by destitution and poverty and placing them in conditions where they may have a chance in life, but if they find parents in misfortune who are worthy in every respect and who cannot care for the family, and yet who love their children as devotedly as parents in more fortunate circumstances, the Society extends to these parents such aid as will enable them to keep their children with them. However, these children are under the watchful care of the Society, and it is distinctly understood that they are to go to school and receive the very best moral training and are to associate with a class of people who will fit them for a better life. This part of the work, known as the Aid Department, is very rapidly becom

ing one of the most important features of the Society's work. The Society does all in its power to keep the family together rather than separate them, and it is only in the extreme cases where the children are taken from the custody and control of the parents. Geo. L. Sehon, who is the head of the organization working in Kentucky, is a humanitarian in the fullest sense of the term, and is familiar with the work being accomplished throughout Kentucky. He is in full sympathy with the child-saving movement in all its phases, and the organization of which he is the head, if not already, is rapidly becoming the most effective wide-reaching and systematic movement in this country. Mr. Sehon is recognized as an authority in such philanthropy and his success, under the direst difficulties for the first few years of his work in Kentucky, has been phenomenal. In beginning the work of the Children's Home Society, Mr. Sehon established from the first the highest ideals in dealing with the work in charge and has, by personally supervising every feature, maintained these ideals until now he has gained the confidence of the Commonwealth's people to the fullest. When the Society began its work ten years ago, its every move was one of difficulty;

and homes is found the spirit that gave Kentucky its reputation for hospitality, a people though unsophisticated and sometimes crude in nature, clannish and independent of the outside world, yet big-hearted and sympathetic, had for a century adhered to the custom of caring for their own destitute children until the Kentucky Children's Home Society gained their confidence. The method of caring for the offspring of their unfortunate people was to take into their homes those little ones when occasion required. Their means of gathering them into their homes was to attend the funeral of their neighbor, and if the relatives were too poor to care for the children lett fatherless and motherless, they would divide them up among those at the grave, take them into their own homes and give them a place with their own family. So true were they to their selfimposed trust that the stranger-child saw no difference in its treatment, but was from its advent into the home made a member of the family.

Since the Kentucky Children's Home Society has proven to these sturdy people that it is worthy of their confidence and that it gives the destitute children every advantage in life, the old custom is no longer followed,

it was necessary to move slowly in the organization of the chosen work and at every turn there was an obstacle, obstacles that to less determined men would have appeared insurmountable; but undaunted in his determination, unswerving in his purpose and spurred on by his own sympathy for the destitute children and fathers and mothers, Mr. Sehon forged ahead until now his Society has the confidence of the people, is substantial and effective in its work and rapidly approaching an era when it will hold a foremost place among the child-saving movements of the age.

Among the many instances of the growing confidence of Kentucky people in the work is the fact that it has already altered conditions in the Kentucky mountains that have been in vogue for the past hundred years. The sturdy mountaineers, in whose hearts

but instead the Society is notified that a family of children needs its help and the little ones are soon well cared for in the homes of the best people of the Commonwealth.

The State of Kentucky, through the abovementioned custom, was probably the first State to begin the work of placing the child in an individual home. The methods of the Society in keeping closely in touch with its wards is most thoroughly complete. There is not a single ward whose record is not complete in the office, and his whereabouts and general condition known. The visiting system followed by the Society is such that not a single child escapes the watchful eye of some of its agents and there is little chance that a ward may be mistreated or illy cared for that the fact does not soon reach the office, when immediate steps are taken to remedy the trouble.

The District Superintendents are men selected carefully to accomplish the work entrusted to them. They are students of human nature, are experienced in the detection of true condition and a misfit condition rarely ever escapes them. Their reports are noted on reaching the office and in every instance where a case requires attention, this attention is given at once, often being remedied before the agent reporting it gets in from the field.

Following the plan of perfecting its system of records, the Society has recently equipped its District Superintendents with cameras, with which photographs are made of all children as they are visited. These photographs are filed with the children's records in the office. The pictures serve varied purposes, chief among which is that they reflect the rearing of the children, at the same time keeping their appearance fresh in the memory of the Society's officials. The record of each ward of the institution is complete. To find any information regarding a child requires but an instant's time.

As proof of the Society's vigil over its hundreds of charges throughout the State a few instances of recent occurrence may be stated. A few weeks ago representatives of the Society were in a county of the State, placing a number of children. While there the fact reached their ears that a girl, less than twelve years of age and an orphan, was being imposed upon in a shameful manner. Though the child was not a ward of the Kentucky Children's Home Society, the agents at once began a quiet investigation. This inquiry resulted in uncovering a shameful state of affairs, followed by the arrest of four persons, three of them negroes, on the charge of having carnal knowledge of a female under twelve years of age. The case was so strongly presented that all four prisoners waived examining trial. Two of them pleaded guilty and accepted sentences to the School of Reform on account of their tender age. The remaining two asked to be allowed to plead guilty and take a Reform School sentence, but being adults were not allowed to do so. The statutory punishment for such a crime in Kentucky is from ten to twenty years' penal servitude.

Another instance where aid is extended to persons not wards of the institution is assist

ing parents of children turned over to the Society as in the case of Mr. Holly, whose picture appears herewith in a group with his children. This man was an object of misfortune until the organization took charge of his children after the death of the mother. He had never been able to earn more than nine dollars a month prior to that time. Soon after his children were taken in charge a position was secured for him by the Society, for which he received a wage of $1 per day until he became more useful. He is doing well, has rented a neat cottage and furnished it nicely and his oldest daughter has been returned to him as his housekeeper, after spending several years as ward of the institution, during which time she became entirely capable of the charge now imposed upon her. The remaining children are still the Society's wards and are all doing well. As an indication of promptness with which the Society takes up a case where a ward is abused or it is suspected that such is the case, the following instance may be recorded:

A District Superintendent was en route to a portion of the field with a child, to be placed in a home. The agent had instructions to place the child and go into another section on other business. However, after his departure from the office a letter, in which it was hinted that a girl was being abused in the eastern section of the State, reached the hands of the State Superintendent. The fact that none of the District Superintendents were in the office at the time made it necessary to reach one of them by wire. The one en route to place the child was already 100 miles away and moving still further as rapidly as a fast train could carry him. At a certain point, however, the conductor came through the car with a message for him, which read, "Leave child in home and return to office at once." The District Superintendent lost no time in reporting back to headquarters, where the case was laid before him and he was soon away to unearth the facts hinted at in the letter.

This aggressive spirit pervades every feature of the Society's work and is rapidly giving it a place in the foremost ranks of childsaving movements in the world. Throughout Kentucky, the Society's chosen field, it is now generally understood that it is dan

gerous to take undue advantage of or abuse in any manner an orphan or helpless child, whether that child is a ward of the organization or not. It is distinctly understood that every destitute child has a champion in the organization which will go its length to avenge a wrong perpetrated upon it, and the Society is revered and respected for its good work in this branch as well as in all others in which it stands in the saving of destitute children.

Among the various methods of the organization in keeping in touch with its wards and the foster parents with whom they are placed is the reunion custom which has been in vogue several years. The Kentucky Children's Home Society does not deem it right to place children secretly in families, but thinks that the child should understand from the very start that it is not a member of the family and that this fact should be generally known. This method for placing children is certainly an advantage as far as supervision is concerned, for everyone knows that the child is a ward of the Society, and if abused do not hesitate to report same as quickly as possible. On Saturday, the 19th of August, a reunion was held on the famous Blue Lick battlegrounds in Fleming County. All the children in that section of the State attended this reunion, the feature of which was on old-fashioned barbecue and basket dinner, spread under the shade of the forest trees. Speeches were made by several prominent citizens of Kentucky. Several officers of the Society were there. Mr. Sehon never fails to attend these annual gatne rings, where he meets the children and their foster parents. By this means the children learn to love and respect their benefactors and are annually reminded that they have a part to play in their welfare and that they are constantly under the watchful care of an institution which is protecting them in their infancy. At these gatherings the little griev ances that arise during the year are adjudicated and arbitrated, and though the gatherings are sometimes expensive, the benefits accruing therefrom are great. These runions are held at various points throughout the State, each year bringing together a large per cent. of the children annually in a body at the reunion, thus welding a closer tie between them, their foster parents and the