The Caldwell tribune. [volume] (Caldwell, Idaho Territory [Idaho]) 1883-1928, 1909-10-09
DEFENSE OF IDAHO BOYS AND
GIRLS.

GIRLS.
The Capital News wants to voice a
word of protest against the indiscrim-
mate commitment of boys and girls
to the reform school of this state.
That institution was established for
purpose and because there was need
for it, but it was not established as
n place for the detension of boys and
girls for trivial and slight reason.
The writer believes that no boy or
girl should be sent to the institution
for the first offense committed unless
that offense should have been of the
gravest nature and not even then un-
less an investigation should disclose
an unmistakable tendency to crime on
the part of the young culprit.
Grown people are all too prone to
forget their youth and the pranks they
committed. The Capital News ven
lures the assertion that there is not
probate judge in Idaho who has not
sent boy to the reform school for
the commission of an offense which
was no more grave nor any more SER
ious than he himself committed when
a boy and thought no more about it.
A distinction should be made be-
tween mere boyish pranks and vicious
and criminal acts. The reform school
was established for children of vicious
and uncontrolled tendencies and not
for boys and girls who are simply full
of life, so glad that they can breathe
and run and kick and yell that they
can no more restrain themselves than
the young colt which rushes madly
away from its parent. No more
should a boy be condemned to years
of punishment for thoughtless exhi-
bition of energy than that same colt
should be killed or given away as
hopelessly vicious because in some
wild plunge it should go farther than
it intended and slipping, crush a
cherished rose bush or break down a
gate.
Boys and girls have not the train
ing as to the rights of others, and
even if they have, they have not yet
established the balance wheel of good
judgment which makes them always
heed those rights, or always have be-
fore them vision of right and wrong,
that older people have, and it is an
awful injustice to commit them to
such an institution for a single Of
Tense or even more than one uncoup7
led with the clearest evidence of absS
lutte viciousness.
Not long ago some boys were Sc t
to the reform school for stealing mel
lons Where is the man who having
the opportunity when a boy and
yorng man, did not sneak into a
neighbours melon patch and again
sneak out bearing a delicious melon? ?
Should all those men, now among the
very best manhood of every commun-
ity, have been caught and sent to a
reformatory? On. the part of the
owner of the patch it may be ad-
mitted that it is highly vexatious, to
say nothing of the loss, to have his
melon patch raided by a pack of
young hoodlums, but what does his
vexation count against the best in
terest of the boys?
To say that there ars as many
vicious characters among the boys
and girls of Idaho as there are among
adult population is a SANDER and a
lie, yet the reform school of this state
has as many inmates in it as has the
penitentiary of the state.
Instead of such a condition it would
be better to fill the penitentiary or
insane asylum a little fuller and that
with county officials guilty of sending
to such a place helpless boys and
girls, full of throbbing life, perhaps
a little misdirected, but far from vi
cious.-Capital News.