The record-union., 1896-01-25
SCHOOL FOR THIEVES.
How San francisco Newsboys Ar
Being Trained.
(From the Stockton Mail)

(Erom the stockton Mall.)
About the most infamous work that
disreputable paper could do is now en-
gaging the pernicious activity of the
San Francisco Examiner" Readers
of "Oliver Twist" will readily recall the
character of Fagin, a despicable
scoundrel, whose business in London it
was to train children to pick pockets.
Mr.. Hearst of New York is at the
moment emulating the example of that
scoundrel His methods are, however,
more demoralizing in their effects upon
the boys of San Francisco than were
the methods adopted by Charles Dick
ems notorious professor of larceny.
Fagin did not make any pretense to
his little disciples that they were en-
gagged in any lawful enterprise. He was
no hypocrite. He was a master thief.
and he wanted his pupils to look up to
him as an artist Hearst adopts diff
ferent plan in the primary school OF
crime He affects to be honest and
virtuous and to be acting within the
law So when he starts out to debauch
good boys, to deaden their moral con-
sciences and to prepare them for
criminal career, he advises them that
they are engaged in an honest and legit-
innate business when they beg street-car
transfer tickets in San Francisco from
passengers and to stimulate trade give
them away with their papers as
species of chrome prize" Thus it will
be readily seen that the Hearst school
is more dangerous to society than the
Fagin school because the pupils in the
former are not made aware that they
are being trained to be convicts and
gallows birds.
1t is true that at present the Southern
Pacific Company is the only victim OF
the depredations of Mr.. Hearst's pupils.
but this fact does not eliminate from
them their larcenous quality. The boy
that is encouraged to believe 1T is no
offense to connive at theft from big
railroad corporation will soon lose all
power to draw nice distinctions in re-
gard to property rights. Having
| learned the first letter in the alphabet
of crime his education in vice is made
sure and he may not stop until he
reaches the end of a rope with a moose
But some thoughtless people, like Po-
| lice Judge Low of San Francisco, for
| instance, may see nothing wrong or de-
moralizing in boys asking street-car
passengers for transfers and in pas
sengers giving them to the boys to do
with them what they please. i al
ways" says the magistrate, take a
transfer whether want to use 1t or not,
| and in case I do not I give it to the
| first boy who asks for it,
The reason why passenger can ride
six miles for five cents on a San Fran
| cisco street railroad is based on the
same principle that the Government
| carries a letter from Stockton to New
York for two cents. There are so many
letters to carry and they are carried all
distances from one mile to 5000 miles
/ for the same price. The man receiving
i A letter at Sacramento from Stockton
who should remove the canceling marks
from the stamp and then affix it to an
! ether letter for Reno, New, would, II
detected. speedily find himself behind
the bars. He would be convicted as
! Government swindler His attempt to
make the two-cent postage-stamp 90
double duty would stamp him as
/ thief. Now, when a street car COM
pany gives a passenger transfer
/ ticket it is done to keep faith with that
passenger and carry him, not another
/ person, over the maximum length of
/ their line. Is it not clear that the at
/ tempt of two persons to ride on one
/ fare is nothing less than making an ex-
pertinent in petty larceny?
According to the Examiners" own
admission the newsboys traffic in
street car transfer tickets is costing
the Southern Pacific Company tens of
thousands of dollars monthly. This as
pect of the question, however, we are
not discussing. 1t is the infamy Of Mr.
Hearst's San Francisco edition of his
New York journal that calls for repro
baton. Could anything more shameful
be done by him than this vile work OF
ccrrupting small boys, who really de-
sire to earn an honest Hving2 And
what must be said Of Judge Low, who
sits on the bench dealing out justice,
and of all men like him who aid and
ahet these poor lads in a clearly dis
honest practice, even though it be not
prohibited by the codes of California?
Is not every passenger who surrenders
his transfer to the use of another per-
son an accessory before the fact in
very small swindle? It is all very well
1 for the Examiner" to pitch into the
Southern Pacific Company. but in doing
so let Mr. Hearst look to it that he does
not turn every newsboy in San Fran
cisco into a thief.