The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-08-15
TIE CURFEW.

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spected on account of its motive, as all
movements are which aim at moral prog
ress or practical reforms. That much harm
and evil come from the practice too COM
mon in this country, of allowing children
the freedom of the streets at night cannot
be doubted for a moment. Great harm
comes from such unrestrained liberty even
in the daytime, and hence the necessity for
compulsory education laws, especially in
cities, to rescue children from schools of
vice and place them in schools of a differ
ent kind. Street roaming at night is as
much worse than the same thing in the
daytime as darkness is more favorable than
light for the generation of evil. Moreover,
many children and young persons who at
tend school or are otherwise engaged in
the daytime, children of respectable and
well-to-do parents who do not belong to the
vagrant class are apt to be given too much
liberty or to take il whether it is given or
not, in the way of being absent from their
homes after nightfan without the slightest
knowledge on the part of their parents
what they are doing, where they are or
what sort of company they are in. Such
license as this offers every sort of facility
and temptation to wrong doing and leads
to the ruin of thousands of children. No
doubt there is less street roaming now than
there before the Introduction of the
bicycle. The wheel has opened an entirely
avenue of juvenile sociability and oc-
cupation, and hundreds of boys and girls
who would otherwise associate on the
streets now do so on wheels, making long
trips that lead to late hours and indulging
in a species of Juvenile conviviality that
would shock their parents if they should
take the trouble of informing themselves
the subject. Some of these young night
riders and street roamers have pleasant
homes and parents, who ought to know bet
ter than to give them such unrestrained
license while others have next to no homes
at all, or at least place where they can
receive young companions and pass a pleas
ant evening in proper and decorous way.
For all the night roaming of children
parents are largely to blame, partly in not
making home more attractive to the chill
dren, partly in not training them properly,
and partly in not exercising parental au-
thority to keep their children out of dan
gerous ways. But parental authority in this
country seems to be becoming a lost art
and the American child is developing into
a young person entirely beyond the reach
of anything of the kind.
Without going further into the causes of
night roaming and the different classes of
children who engage in it, it is enough to
say that the evil exists to an alarming ex-
tent and is a prolific source of Juvenile vice
and school of adult crime. Therefore, any
movement which seeks to reform, minimize
or meliorate it is entitled to respect. That
curfew laws prohibiting children under a
certain age from being on the streets after
a certain hour at night have operated well
in some places there seems to be no doubt
Persons who have lived in towns which
have enacted the law say that the results
have been beneficial. Colonel Hogeland,
whose earnestness in the work of child re-
form cannot be questioned, speaks very
strongly on the subject He says:
The curfew lessons commitments to sta
ton houses, jails and reform schools 80
per cent Not only this, but where it has
prisons in the same proportion and in that
way has protected the trades of honest me-
chanics. Where cities have the curfeW
young hoOdlums no longer raid vacant
houses and steal copper and brass fittings
or break windows. Families where there is
curfeW ordinance are leaVin~ commune
ties in cities and towns and leaving vacant
houses to avoid the influence of neighbors
whose children are on the streets at all
hours of the night. Superiptendents of re-
form schools certify that the curfew, if
honestly enforced Will prevent the commit
ment of boys and girls TO their institutions.
Police officials say it will prevent thousands
of boys from becoming tramps and save
multitudes of young girls from lives of
shame, and lastly, it improves both parents
and children morally and socially.
Making due allowance for the enthusiasm
of a man with hobby, there must be a
basis of truth in these statements, yet they
are lacking in definiteness. They would be
more impressive if accompanied by the
personal statements of officials of cities
where the law has been tried. There may
still be a question whether the curfew is
as we'll suited to cities as it is to small
towns, and whether it's enforcement would
not interfere with other more important
duties of the police. The advocates of the
law ought to fortify their theoretical argu-
ments and general statements with facts
regarding its operation in places where il
has been tried.