The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1901-01-06


| regard to the best method OF suppressing
vice in that city. He says:
81 going after the private dining rooms now
Such places do more harm than all the saloons in
the city Of Chicago. They should not he allowed
TO exist. As long as we are in the reform bust
| ness we should turn attention 10 the great
| est of all the evils.
Saloons and basement dives do not ruin wo
| 1nen- No decent girl would dream of entering
| such places 1t is the private dining room in the
| fashionable restaurant where the first wrong step
| is taken.
| 1t may be said without the slightest
qualification that in this decision Mr..
| Harrison is exactly right. The person,
man or woman, who goes into an ordi-
nary saloon knows where and for what
| he is going. The same is true of the dive.
The people who support these places are
OF responsible age, and those who do
| not wish TO patronize them have only to
keep away. In the case of the private
dining room, on the contrary the per-
| sons who come 20 harm are girls who
| would not think of going into a place
which was admittedly vicious, and who
are not sufficiently familiar with the
| world TO know Nnat they are running
! their heads into. If these girls have not
parents or guardians who are sensible
enough to protect them. the law ought to
do it. Vice. openly admitted and recog-
nized, does but little harm in comparison
with vice which is unrecognized and into
which people are liable TO fall without
understanding the consequences
The standards set up before the mind
of the ordinary girl at her advent into
what is called society in certain large
cities. are mixed enough at best. and it
is not strange that some of them come
20 disregard all standards and do as they
see fit. In the first place continual dis
cussion of marriage as a secular bargain,
rather than as a serious and sacred re-
lation, tends to destroy the natural deli
| cacy and refinement of girls mind. 1t
| is wise, OF course, for a woman to choose
the life to whose responsibilities and du-
| ties she is equal and there are perhaps
few rich women who would be entirely
happy in poverty. II is also true that a
girls fancy sometimes alights upon
sutton who is in every way calculated to
make her miserable. and in such case
1t is the business of the wiser and more
experienced guardian to do what is pos
sible to prevent catastrophe Bat any
relative who. by cold blooded worldliness.
destroys the natural and wholesome
ideals of young girls mind, and at
tempts TO set up in their place a standard
of prudent calculation, is committing
| sin whose consequences are not easily
measured When, in addition to this,
there is a laxness OF public sentiment
which permits alternate sneering at and
playing with the sentiments which should
be the foundation of society. the natural
and inevitable result is the existence of
fast SET" in which it is considered
amusing to wear gowns of indecent fash
ion-there is no other word for some of
the creations which appear at society
functions-to drink highly spiced wines.
and to enjoy suppers in private dining
rooms whence no girl can come with deli
cacy and refinement unmarried, and in
which she is too often given her first i'm
petus toward absolute ruin. 1t is in these
places that the work is begun which is
finished in the disroputable quarter of the
city, and when Mayor Harrison announces
his determination to start a crusade
against them it is safe to say that he has
begun reform that will reform
The trouble with most of the philan-
thropic societies of today-and there
never was an age when so many of them
exsted-is that they waste their time
trying to galvanize corpses, cure incur
ables, and hammer cold iron. The charity
which spends large sums OF money in
trying to reclaim veterans in vice, peo-
pie who are so thoroughly used to life |
OF crime that they would find any other
| moEotonous. is working against the cur
rent. If the same amount of money and
thought we're spent on people who are
not irreclaimable. there would in time be
fewer of the thoroughly vicious ones.
There are comparatively few people who
are really degenerate. The conditions
which allow the existence of what a re-
cent writer has called the under world, |
favor the education of the young in vice |
and crime. There is really not half the |
fun In life of wrong Jo!ag that one would |
suppose. judging from some of the things |
which have been written about it. So |
much has been said about the pleasures |
of vice and the dizziness of virtue that |
young people, especially. are sometimes
" ptiitht ~ ID True MS dLAi- |
tude is encouraged by a strictness which |
magnifes small faults into great sins. for |
when a young mind in process of forma- |
tion is accustomed to disregard the die |
tates of conscience in small matter, |
and subsequently discovers that 1t was |
trifing matter. in spite of the hue and !
cry about 1t. the tendency often is TO con- |
slider sst.s:;ifif: ;.srr,
not worth any attention at all The fact |
is that normal person can get all the |
fun he needs without violating the laws |
of society. and that it requires a per-
verted taste to enjoy really vicious things |
better than those which are wholesome |
The delight which girl takes in the |
gayety OF her frst season Is a perfectly |
natugal and healihful thing. There is
species of intoxication, of very harm |
less kind, in her first contact with the |
world of which she has dreamed. II is |
right for her to enjoy dancing yachting. |
the opera, the admiration OF men. and all 1
the coquetries which are the outcome of |
her young spirits and inexperieRce The /
r,ff If - tl,as 81,