Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1907-07-11
REFORMATION FOR JUVENILE DE-
LJNQJENTS.

Dr. A. :. Ornc or chicago, who is
known as the father of the Juvenile
court, Is in this city, having recently
been making a study of the conditions
in the Empire states reformatory in
stitutions. Or. Orne Is greatly inter-
estetd in securing for Vermont a
school OF industry for juvenile delin-
quents which shall not be tainted by
the admission of those who are hard
ened criminals, although young and
tender IN years.
Not only does DR.. Orne want to sep
arate places of detention for juvenile
delinqnents, but he also desires that
they shall be arraigned in separate
courts and that their records shall be
kept in separate record books reserved
for that purpose. BY doing this, sep
arating the sheep from the goats. as it
were, DR.. Orne is of the opinion that a
ing into the straight and narrow path
those whose feet have strayed tempor-
arily and that crime VIII be greatly
reduced. Dir. Orne has Interested
President Roosevelt in his work and
| the President is ono of his most loval
supporters.
In speaking of his work DR.. Ornc
said:
NV mission Is to create public SEN
! timent favorink the enactment of the
Juvenile court law. which takes charge
Of the dependent child before lie be-
comes Delinquent. Under the pres
ont criminal code the boy with bad
proclivfties is left loose until he is A
full fedeed criminal. When compelled
to arrest him, hs IS taken. tried and
thereafter treated as n criminal by be.
ing thrust into tho penal or somi-penal
fnstitution--compuls schools of
crime or course, when he has served
his sentence he is branded as A. tail
bird and that settles his future as to
position. Disheartencd and disgust
ed, he either goes on the road or com
mits some depreciation and is returned
to the prison to do time. Just think of
It, our criminals have increased IS Der
cent. In the past ten years, while our
population has increased only % per
cent, during tho same period and 100
per cent comes directly from the do
pendent child.
"Of the 100000 tramps. even now
n menace to our civil and Christian
| Institutions. % per cont. came from
the same class Of children. Why. we
pay s5oo,0oo,oOo moro annually for
| Furnishing crime than for pushing
| Christian work. You ask who Is re-
| sponsible? Why. who but parents. who
| have been criuinally careless At n
mass meeting in CHICAGO ]. T. Smith.
! London's great orator, said he had dis
| covered that tho peril 90 America was
| the lack of good men enforcing GER
! tain laws. I replied that is not true;
| this is the age Of laws and vet the
| most lawlcss age of history. No tho
peril Of our America to-day Is a lack
! ana laXity of parental control, fhe care
| and culture Of children. What is Tho
| remedy? The one and the only rem
| edY is the juvenile court and Industrial
schools. These are prevention versus
poor house and prison. much cheaper
and moro Christian Thus every home
less, helpless boy and girl are offered
! tnelr fou-glNen opportunity to become
| self supporting. clean citizens. a bless
| ing instead of burden to society"
Or Orne, who with his wife is maxi
| ing a tour of the world in the inter
est OF the project. will visit the city
court in Burlington to-day, and he OK
poets to spend some time in the state
In trying to interest prominent men in
the movement
We regard this as an important step
In the direction of prison reform. Peo-
pie realize that in order to secure i'm
provement in youth It Is well to begin
| their instruction in tender years ami
this is particularly true Of the coun-
teraction of criminal tendencies We
believe that this same theory could be
applied with advantage to our states
prisons, separating prisoners serving
time for their first offence from
hardened criminals, and the time
Is probably not far distant when this
distinction will be observed in all penal
and reformatory institutions.