The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1899-12-12
THE HooDLUM QUESTION.


The question of how to deal with the
wharf rats and other hoodlums of the
city is a serious one, though few people
seem to give the matter much thought.
The Star pointed out yesterday the To-
cation of three gangs, other than the
wharf rat gang, and it would be we'll
If they could be broken up. 1t is not
lack of education that is to be COM
planned of in these boys. OF the eleven
arrested on the wharf a week ago, all
could read and write and all could talk
English. Each boy had been to school.
It was found that the boys were able
to keep accounts, for they had bank
err, who took charge of the funds and
issued and charged up money for their
meals and other expenses.
Education, though excellent in itself,
is not the panacea for all social ills.
Forty or fifty years ago it used to be
thought so, but experience has proved
that education is by no means neces-
sarily a safeguard from criminality. In
point of fact education has frequently
made only the smoother rogue and the
more accomplished villain. But this
does not prove that education is faulty,
it only proves that bad material may
be polished, but 1t remains bad materi-
al. A paste diamond, however much
it may glitter, remains a paste diamond
it can never pass for real stone.
We do, however, require some safe
guard against these youths and boys
sinking into lower depths. At present
it is idleness gambling, and may be
some pilfering. Later it will develop
into crime of deeper dye, into burglary,
highway robbery and mayhap into
homicide. There is doubt about the
easy grade downward of such boys, and
with the development of the male hood
lum will come the development of the
female hoodlum and the eventual per-
petuation of criminal families costing
the State untold amounts.
1t was not so long ago that a gang
of hoodlums used to regularly collect
in Palama, a perfect nuisance to the
neighborhood, and their rough horse
play resulted one night in a stabbing
ARRAY which brought one lad tosdeath's
door and landed another in jail. -. -. Z, q
1t is easy, however, to point out the
evils, it is very much more difficult to
| point out the remedy. Good work IN
the direction is done by the Salvation
Army, the members of which under
stand how to work in the slums, and do
not attempt conversion from the point
of view of the broad cloth coat, the
plug hat and the morning Sunday
school. The latter are excellent in their
place, but they do not attract the hood
| lum or the wharf rat. Some others
have worked in this direction also, and
have a measure of success. -l--si
But what is needed is to try and re-
move the young hoodlum from his sur
roundings, and for this an Industrial
School is urgently needed. There should
! be one for boys and one for girls and
the work in them should be reformatory
and not punitive. 1t is to raise and not
to degrade that we must strive after.
There will be a certain percentage
saved and made good and useful mem
! bers of the community, and there will
be another percentage it is to be hoped
very small one, which will prove
hopeless and graduate from the Indus
trial School into the Jail. But if we
set the bulk of this class on the road
to industry and independence, we shall
have accomplished good work for the
future of the Territory.
Meantime it is a fact that the eleven
little wharf rats, after five days punish
ment breaking stones have returned to
their old companions, and are starting
out on their gambling, idling and pill
fering career once more.