Ohio State University Press. This book offers more than its subtitle suggests. Joel Best, a historically minded sociologist, skillfully uses St. Paul's regulation of prostitution and the controversy surrounding it to build a model of how societies respond to ineradicable deviance. Regulatory schemes work better than prohibition, which invites corruption and organized crime. They are unstable and politically vulnerable, however, because they implicitly sanction immoral activities.
Regulated vice is a moral eyesore.
At least it was in St. Paul, Minnesota, where politicians and police devised a practical system for dealing with prostitution. The system, which had variants in many nineteenth-century American cities and towns, formally criminalized prostitution. What they were actually doing was renewing a contract to keep orderly disorderly houses. Madams who tolerated robberies and assaults in their brothels risked heavy fines and imprisonment. 2 Respectable citizens objected to regulated brothel prostitution because it offended their moral principles, subverted the law, blighted their neighborhoods, and discriminated against women.