The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1912-03-01

| infraction OF law against the whole
social fabric, demanding stern de-
| cree of punishment.
| The pimple, grown to be an eating
cancer, calls for segregation and a
surgeons knife. segregation, that
property rights may be preserved,
surgery, that the victim may be saw
ed. The old method was simply seq
gregation, allowing the canceerous
sore to eat deeper into the heart and
more certainly complete the moral
damnation, as Orientals seggregate
| the leprous to rot in the awful loath-
someness of each others company.
said the old method. Unfortunately
it is not a wholly discarded method.
BY way of illustration: In north
| Florida city, not many years ago, it
was my unhappy duty to visit felon
in his cell lin the common county
Jail. There were to be found housed
all grades of criminal human beings,
from the convicted and sentenced
murderer to the suspected gaunt-faced
purloiner of meagre feast of dry
bread. In one cell were four boys,
the oldest hardly more than 16 years
of age, the youngest not over IL. One
at time questioned them. The old
est, white boy, sodden and sullen,
was there charged with "fghtin' and
cussin'." One had been chicken
coping" One, 81 was pitchin' craps,
boss" and one, the little fellow with
his shiny black face pressed against
the old rusty steel bars of his
"cage," grinning his satisfaction at
a word of friendly notice, thereby dis
playing two rows of pearly teeth,
that might have been the envy of en-
perors, said, in reply to my inquiry
as to the cause of his Incarceration,
II don't 'zackly know, boss" My
| heart sickened. The children were
criminals under our common law, but
they were veritable kindergartens
sitting at the feet of past masters in
the art of crime.
We are more considerate of physi-
cal conditions. We seggregate ty-
phoid fever, but we do not group
community's patients that the slight
ly i'll may be RECALLED with the delir-
ium of desperate cases, nor do we
leave the convalescent to relapse in
the foul odors from the chamber of
death. But, when we approach one
morally sick we too often group all
grades of disease, all ages and all
classes into common herds, placing a
youth in his teens" who, under the
influence of liquor, FORCES a check
for a weeks room rent, in close fell
lowship with grizzled criminal, who
has looted a bank and killed the cash.
Ter to escape arrest.
Happily there is some improve
ment. The signs of the times are in
dicative of an awakening. Criminals
convicted of minor offenses even now
are not permitted grouping with the
more degraded and abandoned. Then,
too, We are. moving in the line of a
practical effort to save the youthful
criminal from the disgrace of any
form of criminal life. This line of
work is taking practical form under
the direction of such men as Judge
Ben Lindsey of Denver, Col, Mr..
George of Freeville, N. Y, and DR..
Crawford Jackson of our own south
land. Judge Lindsey is typical OF the
criminal boys friend before the court.
Mr.. George is a boys friend for a
new and better environment, as evil
denced in the splendid work of his
Junior Republic at Freeville. DR..
Jackson is blending both of these
agencies in the south. Through the
influence and work of the Juvenile
Protective Association. Seven south
ern states have provided by statutory
law for juvenile courts, where young
offenders may be separately tried be-
fore probation officers" and when
the child in years and crime can be
cared for outside of Jail doors and
sentences. In addition, DR.. Jackson
has been the inspiration and leader
in establishing, near Athens, Ga, an
institution known as "The Junior
State" which is doing much for boys,
whose local environment at home
promises nothing but bad to worse,
but who are given home, there with
ideal surroundings and influence.
In physical maladies, the first
thought of the physician is for the
best possible environment for his pa
tient So it must be for the boy who
has gone wrong. Primarily, his sur
roundings have been at fault. This
must be bettered, hence the need for
such institutions as the Junior State,
Hence schools of reform everywhere.