The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1877-06-15
LET DEOENCY COME TO THE FRONT.

Many complaints have come up from
persons whose daily avocations take
them past certain portions of the city,
where immortality faunts its brazen
front in the broad glare of the noon-day
sun and under the evening gaslight
with equal impunity, concerning the
shamelessness with which lewd women
deport themselves. 1t is complained,
and with great reason, that young men,
scarcely more than boys, are allured by
these women into the hauIts of vice,
and spend much of their time lettering
around these corners, conversing with
the inmates of brothels. This is surely
deplorable state of affairs. The moth
ers are powerless, the fathers indiffer-
ent-or seemingly so-the police blind
with willful blindness, the boys idle,
curious, shameless, and fast becoming
conversant with vice in its most subtle
and degrading form.
Is it possible that the moral men and
women of this city must be defied, and
that continually by harlots and those
infinitely worse, who support them in
luxury? Is there no longer law upon
our statutes that can be offended? q? and
must virtuous women, for common de-
cency's sake, veil their faces and hurry
along our principal thoroughfares, or
use unfrequented streets to escape in-
suit? And are there not, in all con-
science, enough of lewd men, from early
manhood to hOary age, without recruit
ing the ranks of licentiousness by levy
ing upon the boys?
Hundreds of mothers do not even sus-
pect evil, but, prating of dresses, and
arranging furniture, and planning din
ners, they imagine they are fulfilling
the highest duties of womanhood and OF
motherhood, while their young sons, to
the disgust of more observing people,
loiter upon corners, smoke cigars, and
talk to prostitutes. Others, with anx-
ious hearts, speaking through fearful
eyes and quivering lips, try the effect:
of wOman's influence, but find, to theil
sorrow, that it is overborne, if not by
the fathers example, by his indifference
But fathers, what are you doing
City Fathers, why are these fountains
of iniguity allowed full play upon ou
most elegant streets and busiest corners
City guardians, are you conniving a
crime, that you permit such flagran
violations of decency and order to pas
unnoticed before your very eyes? or ar
you as changed by many in league will
licentiousness and "hand in glove" will
vice?
Speaking of the shameless habits o
numbers of young men and boys VIII
make the vicinity of brothels thei
lounging-place, a correspondent of th
Bee very sensibly suggests as a remed.
that they be treated as vagrants-what
indeed, they are, and let the vagran
laws be enforced impartially against al
classes, rich or poor, high or low, VIII
, can find no better employment for thei
, time than by spending it in converse
, ton and company with lewd women
1t is in the power of the police to brea
up this disgracefnl and debasing habi
> if they will. Let decency come to tn
front, supported by law, and if person
will debauch their bodies and sully thei
? lives by vice, let their lurking-places b
banished from the city limits, as mora
+ pest-houses, dangerous in every sens
e to the public peace and safety not onl
4 of present, but of future generations.