The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1903-12-10

| cieties of the country. In this meeting
number of well known business men
| of the east took part.
I 1t has been said that there has been
no real cure for the American beggar
! and tramp evil, and that the one. hope
for the future lay in keeping young
boys off the road-and, to some extent,
young girls IS weldon the principle that
an ounce of prevention Is worth a pound
of cure. Now. however, Il cure has been
| found. The railroads, acting in conjunc-
ton with mendicancy police forces in he
cities, have decided to dose the lines of
communication. Tramps will not he able
to more about They will be kept,in the
| great cities-under the eye and control
of the Charity organization societies ard
| the police. AS for the boy who begins his
| career of vagrancy at the village rail
road water tank, he is TO be taken from
| the hands Of the lockers" lie is to
be sought everywhere. The strongest
! part of the whole now movement will be
devoted TO finding incipient vagabonds,
and the lockers" are to be repressed.
To those who do not know just what
| locker is an explanation is due. His
relation to his 'kid'-the boy he enslaves
is the result of some village or city
boys adventurous temperament seek
| ing what appears to be the only outlet
! for his energies. In the case Of the boy
/ resident in a small, dull town, where
wages are low and life is monotonous, the
/ locker finds plastic material. a boy
! leading such a life is tool fashioned to
/ his hand. Once persuaded TO join him in
the 'care-free life Of the road'-and the
tucker paints his picture with glow
! ing colors-the boy swiftly degraded. The
first step is 10 make him lie or beg. or
steal some small thing. Anything is done
to make him lose his seif-respect. After
that has been accomplished he goes the
downward path his own volition, and the
boy is a rover doomed TO lie, beg and
steal for the cocker" his master Thus
! tramps are made. The tramp is an
American type. Few other countries are
cursed with this evil as we are Aus
tralia has its 'sun-downers." so-called
from their habit Of appearing at the
front gate or back door at shutdown with
request for lodging. each night finding
them at new door, or gate. and Poly
nesia has its bleach combers who get
their name from the fdrc that they haunt
the beaches to search among the fiotsam
and jetsam for small treasure trove in the
way of washed-up fruit and cast-off
clothing. But these men are nothing like
/. the menace to society this country en-
dures at the hands of the professional
beggar. cripple. vagrant and mendicant
The fight between the tramp and the
society from which he is an outcast is as
GO ha &c ind - DO.
bly, moved on from state to state, he
leaves a trail of burned barns robbed
henroosts, railroad wrecks frightened
children. terrorized women and hundreds
upon hundreds of cases of petty larceny
to say nothing of the more serious out
RACES, such as burglariZing OF country
banks and postoffices, too often conci-
dent with the killing of policemen and
watchmen. He reforms today and is sor-
ry for it. and backslides tomorrow
Jailed today as a punishment he is out
and ar work at worse things the follow
ing day.
It is TO alter this condition of affairs
that the railroads, the charity organiza-
ton societies and the police have at last
banded together with the aid of infuen-
tial and pubiic-spirited citizens. The or
binary police organization is perhaps of
necessity restricted in practice to certain
lines of effort which cannot take &C
count. to any appreciate extent, OF the
influence of various conditions of life and
social usages upon the individual tenn
permanent. For that reason. a menaicancy
police force is being established in all the /
principal cities of the country. to act
in, nit, ,,,i,z oh,
railroads are increasing their own police |
forces. The Baltimore and Ohio railroad |
has lately added 200 men TO its staff sole |
iy for the purpose Of coping with the |
tramp evil. They are to be kept off the |
railroads. They are no longer to be al |
lowed to derail ears. tamper with /
switches, burn bridges and rob and kin |!
tOwermen and station agents in out Of |
the wayiplaces. They are to be kept in |
the cities They will not travel along the |
country roads That means walking and |
work They are 10 be rounded up in |
the cities. and wherever gathered in are |
to he permanently disposed of. The aged |
and crippled and infirm are to he sent /
to almshouses-and kept there The I
charity organization societies are to be /
consulted in each individual case OF 4
prospective release. IT should not be for
gotten that primarily the object of all /
this society police work and the new
movement of which this committee is a
the head is the saving Of thousands Of
lives now going To ruin. Repression is
simply an incident OF the campaign for
bctterment.
The boy tramp Is the most sinister of
all phases Of juvenile delinquency. and
he offers the most dI1icuit Of all the
problems for the suppression Of the whole
line for from his ranks is the whole army
Of male tramps recruited. The hosts of
blind and crippled heggars-male ard fe-
male-require the next largest amount of
care and anxiety.
The latest development. perhaps the
most important in the fight against the
tramp. has been the extension to men
delaney police work OF the Bertilion sys-
TEN of Identification. In further conneC-
ton with this advance orders are now
I'm force insuring the immed ate notica-
ton of the charity organization society's
departments by the police in
all cases of arrests for me1Gicancy. The
charity organization societies are thus
furnished with the full record and des-
cription of each and every Individual
committed as a vagrant. and with this
plan in successful operation the end OF
the great fight in America Is in sight.
The tramp will have TO 90 to work.