The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1910-08-08
SPECIAL PRIVILEGE N VICE.

SPECIAL PRIVILEGE IN VICE.
The story of the raid on a fashionable gamb
ling den at Narragansett Pier in one way serves
only TO give publicity to what practically every
one knows to be the truth respecting that and
other resorts affected by people of wealth and
fashion. Indeed, the whole tenor of the life
ut these places is pitched upon an assumption Of
superiority to the laws of the statutes and thu
canons of TASTE which Is theoretically as false
Is it is practically assured In the Narragan
sett instance, it is charged that the con
stables attempting to enforce the law against
gambling were prevented by the Chief of Police
acting in direct defiance of the orders of the as
sistant Attorney General of the State-from Sc
curing the evidences of crime, and that they
were actually arrested in order that the gamb
lers may escape effective prosecution.
It is the arrogant attitude of the offenders in
this and other notorious instances which il
worthy of serious public attention, rather thar
the specific violations of the law. 1t matters
little to the public at large that small set Of
ultra fashionable individuals of the idle class
should be personally so lost to sense of the or
binary decencies as TO look to the dive for in
spiration for the amusement of high society"
TN the contrary, it matters great deal that this
same element should undertake to violate the Law
q special privilege appertaining to their posi-
ton and their means. 1t matters more that,
having assumed such privilege, they should be
able SO far TO force its recognition as to enlist
In aid OF violation of the law the officers of the
law. 1t Is matter calling for general reflection
that the greed induced by the presence of rich
summer colony should be sufficient to deaden
the loyalty to law of law-abiding communities.
It matters very much indeed that in the raid in
question were discovered a score of women so
fashionable that their names, if published, would
be known throughout the country at large and
that the names of these women were evidently Sc
potent as to gain them protection against the
publicity Of news bureaus to which the promin-
Gnce OF their NAMES was in itself large and
valuable asset. 1t is clear point in a constantly
sharpening situation of unrest, that the class
most insistent upon protection of person and
property by the law, should be the very class, as
whole, most contemptuous of the law itself.
Beside these considerations appealing TO a
natural imitation of vicious practice growing out
Of natural jealousy on the part of the people
generally of privilege arrogated by partcl,-
lar class, is the example set by the women in
the public eye who have seized upon gambling as
the visible sign of social preemienence We wish
that we could say in particular what may be said
truthfully in general that the doings and the
vices of the wealthy and fashionable set among
women do not affect the great body of women Of
the country. 1t is true that the grosser vices of
this conspicuous class have not yet 30 far de-
fled the women of the country as to gain for
them the sympathy and excuse that they obtain
IN the more rarifed social circles. But it Is
equally true that the grosser vices which fill the
divorce calendars are born of the foibes the
petty departures from convention, the assump
tons of license with which society" fatters il
self on its superiority. These things are imi-
lated as fashions from Paris find duplication at
the hands of village dressmakers. More than
that, their imitation in the country at large is
exactly as demoralizing as entirely deadening
10 the moral sense, perfectly destructive OF
womanly virtues as the things themselves are
corruptlng TO the class in which they find their
origin. Gambling among women takes wider
and swifter course because it is of peculiar an,
peal to feminine sentiment. The bridge whist
party at penny points runs quickly into craze.
The delicate cocktail, the scented cigarette i'm
percepnhly but surely mark the first attacks on
character. The gross evils, the absolute un
morals obtaining among the cult of breeding
based on money viii follow as certainly as the
smaller, but equally demoralizing vices, will be
copied among the great mass of women of strong
moral fibre that goes to make up the body of
the mothers and wives Of the land 1t is strange
but trne that an Alice Longworth who as a wo-
man Of small town would meet with ostracism
md contempt, can nevertheless out of false
conspicuousness definitely influence for evil a
class of women, pure and sound and real
We are aware that remedy for such condition
eeens on the surface hopeless. It can come
- i must come if the loss to the nation is not
M - shortly vital--oniy when the women of
1 - countsy shall sse in the women of the Casino