Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1877-08-25

vas SOOn 1ONAAAA LII pAebStlNeSAC5 S1iANA -
arge general increase in the police
orce became necessary, much to the
inconvenience of the rate-payer.
The evil did not abate. The CARROT
ing panic came next; this was
highway robbery diffused
,ver a wider surface than before
chiefly in the suburbs) and gener-
lily stopping short of murder, but
lot always.
A thorough investigation of me-
crime and criminals was
now made under the auspices of |
from which it became |
that crime in London was
by a body of men as elabOr-
ately organized as any department
Of government that the police with
a thorough knowledge Of the system
and in many cases of the persons
constituting it were only on rare oc-
casiOns able to bring home to them
overt acts such as to render them
to the law. 1t was also
found that there were schools of
crime in which children were sys-
matically trained to the various de-
partments of robbery, mendicancy
and prostitution. The only legisla-
tive result of this commission was
the Habitual Criminals Act; it
gave the police the power to arrest
persons who were known to have
no honest means of livelihood and
to be in league with known crimi-
mails, and the magistrates had the
power to imprison them. 1t did not
work efficiently from the difficulty
of procuring evidence, and at any
rate the criminal classes increased
much faster by recruits from the ris-
ing generation than it was dimin-
ished by the arrest of a few veter-
ans. 1t became at last manifest
that any really efficient treatment of
the evil must be directed to juvenile
criminals and to those classes of
children who were most liable to
become so.
From the time that this principle
was clearly recognized and intelli-
gently acted upon, an undeniable
improvement has taken place, as
any one who studies comparatively
the police records of the present day
must infer.
The first efforts i'll this direction
were made, as the case with
everything good which is done in
England, by the efforts of pri-
vate individuals and voluntary as
ISOLATION, and probably the first in
situations were boys and girls lodg-
ing houses. These were mainly to
provide a place for children to sleep
who arrived in town from the cOun-
try, the Oliver Twists and Noah
Stackpoles, giving them shelter be-
fore they came in contact with the
Artful DOdger. ReformatOries were
also established for the punishment
of minor offences in Juvenile crimi-
nails without assOciating with hard
ened professional thieves and prOsti-
tutes. When all the little good had
been done which they were capable
of affecting, it was found to be but
little; the main source by which the
criminal ranks were recruited was
as yet untouched; the recruits were
the children of crime, want, intem-
perance and prOfigacy, who were
themselves hardened criminals be-
fore the law could touch them they
were virtually orphans as soon as
they could walk, for their parents
had no care about them except to be
relieved of the trouble of providing
for them, unless perchance thew
were sharp enough to be taught to
steal adrOitly.
The remedy was now clear-they
were orphans and the State must
adopt them. The only legislation
which was needed was to make ed
ucatiOR uqirerS0L and compulsory,
and to deprive those persons of the
rights of parentage who refused its
responsibilities. Schools were es-
tabIished everywhere, and the
school commissioners had right to
the aid of the police in arresting all
vagrant children without waiting
for them to be convicted of crime ;
it was enough that they were Meth
er at school, nor at work, nor at
home. Parents who had any means
whatever were punishable if they
did not send their children to school;
and the thousands for whom no re-
sponsible parents could be found
were the children Of the State and
educated as such and employment
found for them afterwards.
The admirable institution of train
ing ships and training farms now
came into supplement these provis-
ions. Itwas found that the schools in
London, even with the police to
help, could not keep the children in
school and out of the streets. The
government then detailed several
ships as training ships in which boys
taken from the streets of London
were trained for service in the navy
and private beneficence soon sup
plemented these with Others in
which boys We're trained for the
commercial marine, and govern
ment farms were procured in which
they We're trained to agricultural
labor. In "A word, every device was
| put in practice for taking out o
! London those who would otherwise
have added to its criminal popula
| ton.
The remedy had at last been found
education the police had no Longer
the handling of the matter except
so far as to place the children il
the hands of the teacher, and the
schools of Fagin and his cOmpeerS
! were SuDprSpdpd bV the schools al