The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-07-11
DECISION IN VAUGHAN CASE
BOARD OF HEALTH WILL CONSIDER
 THE RATIFICATION TONIGHT.


 Probably be Then Decided Arguments of Counsel for Both Sides Submitted in Writing soturday--D Digests of the Briefs.
 the counsel for the applicant and for the remonstrantS in the Vaughan case, the board of health will hold a special meeting at o'clock tonight for the purpose of considering the testimony taken at the hearing and the arguments of counsel. It is probable that the board will tonight render a decision on the question as to whether or not h- cense to conduct a maternity hospital at No. 8 Prospect place should be grant ed. The arguments of counsel were submitted in writing to the board Sat urday morning.
 MIR. ALLING'S ARGUMENT. After speaking of the unsuitability of the place, MT. filling said:
 "The most important question, how ever, is the character of the applicant, and upon this point the evidence is overwhelming:
 l. What shall be the standard l of character requisite for the keeper of such a hospital, and especially for the purpose of keeping it in the way this woman proposes to keep it? This wo- man is not a physician; she is not a woman of reputation or standing as a physician. Her institution never had | and never will have the character | which a permanent resident physician might give it. In her advertisement in | that admittedly pestilential sheet the | Waterbury Herald, she boldly says: l Physicians can attend their own l cases" | Unfortunately the statute does not | require the record of anything but the | departure, removal or withdrawal of the child, and the names and residences | of the persons who take the child and whatever disposition of such child or | it's body is made, and the place where | it is taken and left. All that the stat ute requires, unfortunately, is compiled with upon the delivery of the babies one or two days old, to Miss Winkel- man, formerly of New York, but now 1 of Philadelphia.
 Confessedly, from the statement of the woman, many of her cases were | those where the mother never cared to see her baby, and it is sad reflection upon the character of her institution that it tends to promote the destruc- l tion of maternal instinct.
 It is at once apparent that no honor l able board of health could for one mo- ment think of intrusting the responsi- bility of such an institution IS this, eX- cept to hands entirely clean, and tC persons whose character and reputa- tion are unquestioned. Such were the known intent and purpose of the law Any other interpretation or construc- tion of this statute, any other course o1 conduct by the board of health would make such institutions as this but schools for crime.
 2 Mrs. Vaughan is thirty-nine years of age Her oldest child is twenty-foul years Ol dSe, IL W6lS ttlcI ItLOlC Dplil II 1874 when the mother was only fifteer years of age. She was not married un til 1S79 She has three other children whose father is Thomas Godfrey, ye they are all called Vaughan, ant wherever their family history is knowr the suggestion of illegitimacy is at once | apparent,
 As proved by Mrs. Preston, uncon tradicted by any of the policemen wht witnessed the affair, this eldest daugh ter, in 1889, fifteen years of age, sait that her mother was 8 bad woman. ant kept a bad place, and that she would not live in 1t.
 The immediate neighbors of Mrs | Vaughan on Stevens street testify t the following facts:
 (a) A course of living with Mr. Pen ney, a married man, separated iron his wife, who lived across the stree with four children, under circumstan ces which showed that in the neighbor hood such a course of living was re garded as scandalous, and Mrs Vaughan herself admits that she con tinued such conduct with full knowl
 
 ing in the street.
 The testimony is of familiar, caress ing behavior between MT. Penney ant Mrs. Vaughan as observed by tn neighbors; the occupation of a common bedroom at night as observed by Mrs Penney herself, identifying the woman by the dressing of her hair.
 (b) A course of conduct with on Hoffmeister, resulting in visit of Mrs Hoffmeister, when as the neighbor claim, Hoffmeister was in the hous of Mrs. Vaughan, and the denunciatio of Mrs. Vaughan in the public streets
 Co Frequent visits of men to tn house at various hours of the nigh their furtive entrance and sudden de parture, accompanied by anxious pre vious survey of the street, in one cas the departing guest so enthusiastic shaking hands with Mrs. Vaughan 8 to pull her out upon the platform where apparently her arms were bar and the reception of such visitors ordinary dress, and seeing them to th door in night attire,
 (d) Young women, three months ( so along, and nowhere near their flu terms, around the place, disappearin from sight for few days, reappearinl pale, weak, for a few days. and the gone-manifestly cases of miscarriag resulting, as is substantially admittet from abortion.
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