The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1898-11-14
THE CURFEW ORDINANCE
EIGHT O'CLOCK THE LIMIT
0oyo yound on tho 0erssss After That
Usur WIN h Attended To by
the Polics-It WIN

n city council viii meet again to-
morruw night. at which time the new
eurfew ordinance viii be introduced.
The object OF the curfew ordinance is
the abatement of the bad boy nuisance.
which has become intolerable in GER
tain sections Of the city. The new ordi-
nance will provide that all boys. or
girls. either. for that matter, found
upon the streets after s o'clock in the
evening from Nov. 1 to April 1. and
after . o'clock In the evening from
April I to Nov. I. shall be arrested and
confined in jail.
The new curfew ordinance will pass.
Nearly every alderman in the city coun-
ell has expressed himself upon the mat
ter. and every alderman will vote for
II. The aldermen figure that boys have
no business on the streets after s
o'clock In the winter time. and that
the fact Of their being out is not only
harmful to themselves, but also Is an
unsatisfactory thing generally. The
police will be given the strictest of in
structions regarding the enforcement of
the new curfew ordinance, and II will
be an ordinance that will be enforced
TO the letter.
Pertinent to this bad boy problem and
the curfew question. Kate Thorn writes
some sensible sentences in the New
York Weekly. showing the harmful ef-
fects that late hours have upon a child.
The article runs:
In some of the staid towns of the
East an ordinance has been passed au-
thorizing the ringing Of the curfew bell
ut 8 o'clock every evening. And II is re-
quired Of all parents N guardians to
20 see to II that all children n young
people under a specified g shall be
within their homes before the bell has
ceased ringing.
There are many good points about
this regulation, though there has been
TO use an expressive If not elegant
phrase good deal of kicking over
the provision.
Nobody disputes the fact that il n
wants to enjoy health and to attain a
reasonable old age sleep must be had
regularly and in sufficient measure to
repair the waste which is continually
going on in the human system. No per-
son. young or old, can go without suffi-
cient sleep and not suffer the conse-
Quences for 1t in physical degeneration.
And the growing child requires more
sleep than the adult, since he has a
double strain to support. Not only the
ordinary wastes of life are his to repai
but he must furnish force to feed the
growing tissues OF his body; and IL he
is in school. there is an added draft
upon his energies. o only of body. but
Of mind.
when we look about US. and see the
little children wearing glasses like their
grandfathers. and complaining of being
tired. and talking about their nerves.
we feel that possibly the curfew bell
may be a necessity for which we should
all hold up our hands.
within the memory of most OF us
older people, there has been such a
change-gradual indeed. but none the
less radical-in the method Of bringing
up' children, hat we hardly realize how
different everything is in this regard
Thirty or forty years g children
were put to bed by s or 8 o'clock, and
were expected to get up in the morning
fresh inc bright for the Z o'clock
breakfast. And they developed into
sturdy men m women, capable OF do
ing their life work with a will, unham-
pered by aches and pains with un-
pronounceable names, and not confined
to spectacles till they were past middle
age; n when they died they had
rounded four or five score of years.
and had never known what 1t was to
have nervous prostration.
But to-day how is 1t? The children
20 everywhere. They cry IL they can
not. They expect to go. They are out on
the streets in the evening, and they stay
as long as anybody else. They sing in
Sabbath school concerts. and because 1t
Is a Sabbath chool concert nobody
must object to IT. They take part in
c~antatas and operas for the benefit of
this or that charity; N you mustn't
say a word against 1t because 1t is such
a good cause And there are rehearsals
every night or two for a month. and by
the time the cantata Is over. the chill
dren IN are working in such a good
cause are so and exhausted
with excitement and loss OF sleep that
II is all anybody can do to live in the
house with them. They have been I'M
duly ~excited-their thoughts ave been
diverted from the channel where a
child's thoughts SHOULD flow quietly on
their minds have been taken from
their studies, their sleep has been
broken, and the rest needed by their
growing bodies has been taken away
from them. They are physically ex-
hausted, and the strain upon their high
ly sensitive organism has been too great
for immediate recuperation.
I'm all cases where nervous power Is
used I'D before IL is generated, disaster
must result. The crowded rooms, the
foul air, the feasts of Ice cream n
cake at unwonted late hours. derange
the digestion and disturb the functions
Of the brain and heart: and the next
day after a dissipation Of this sort. the
child goes back to school. and the let