The Penn's Grove record., 1913-01-31
WAGE WAR ON
FORCES OF EVIL
Bureau of Social Hygiene
Fighting White Slave Traffic
A GREAT WORLD PROBLEM
The Organization Made Permanent
Because Temporary Activities of
Former investigating Bodies
DID Not Alarm Traffickers.

FORMER investigating BODIES
DID Not Alarm Traffickers.
t~raffickers are face to face with a
movement for their suppression, which
is not of the temporary and h~ysterical
kind, but one organized to carry on
the warfare continuously from genera
ton to generation, is made plain by
the following statement issued for
publication by John D. Rockefeller, Jr.:
The Bureau of Social Hygiene came
into existence about two years ago, as
a result of the work of the Special
Grand Jury appointed to investigate
the white slave traffic in New York
City, which served during the first
half of the year 1910. One of the
recommendations made by it in the
presentment handed up at the termi-
nation of its labors was that a public
commission be appointed to study the
social evil. The foreman of that body
subsequently gave careful considera-
ton to the character of the work
which might properly be done by such
a commission and the limitations un-
der which it would operate. In this
connection, separate, personal confer
ences were held with over a hundred
leading men and women in the city,
among whom were lawyers, physi-
clans, business men, bank presidents,
presidents of commercial o~rganiza-
tons, clergymen, settlement workers,
social workers, labor leaders and re-
formers. These conferences devel-
oped the feeling that a public COM
mission would labor under a number
of disadvantages, such as the fact that
it would be short lived; that it's work
would be done publicly; that at best
it could hardly do more than present
recommendations. The conviction also
grew that the main reason why more
permanent results had not been OBJ
tanned by the various organizations
which had dealt with the subject of
the social evil during the past ten or
fifteen years was that most of them
we're temporary. While active, they
materially improved the situation, but
as their efforts were relaxed, there
came the inevitable return to much
the same conditions as before. The
forces of evil are never greatly alarm
ed at the organization of investigating
or reform bodies, for they know that
they are generally composed of busy
people, who cannot turn aside from
their own affairs for any great length
of time to carry on reforms, and that
sooner or later their efforts will cease,
and the patient denizens of the under
world and their eXploiters can then
reappear and continue the traffic as
formerly.
So the conviction grew that in order
to make a real and lasting improve
ment in conditions, a permanent or
%ganization should be created, the con
tinuation of which would not be de-
pendent upon a temporary wave of re-
form, o upon the life of any man or
group of men, but which would go on
generation after generation, continu-
ously making warfare against the
forces of evil. 1t also appeared that
a private organization would have,
among other advantages, a certain
freedom from publicity and from polit-
fcal bias, which a publicly appointed
commission could not so easily avoid.
Therefore, as the initial step, in the
winter of 1911 The Bureau of Social
Hygiene was formed. Its present
members are Miss Katherine Bement
Davis, Superintendent of the New
York State Reformatory for Women at
Bedford Hills, New York; Paul M.
Warburg, of the firm of Kuhn, Loeb &
Company: Starr J. Murphy, of the
New York Bar; and John D. Rookie.
Teller, Jr. AS the work develops, new
members may be added.
One of the first things undertaken
by the Bureau was the establishment
at Bedford Hills, adjacent to the Re.
formatory, of a Laboratory of Social
Hygiene, under Miss Davis's. direction.
In this laboratory it is proposed to
study from the physical, mental, SO.
cial and moral side each person, com
mitted to the Reformatory. This study
will be carried on by experts and each
case will be kept under observation
for from three weeks to three months,
as may be required. When the dag.
nosis is completed it is hoped that the
laboratory will be in position to recon
mend the treatment most likely to re.
form the individual, or, if reformation
is impossible, to recommend perman
ent custodial care. Furthermore
reaching out beyond the individuals
involved, it is believed that thus i'm
portant contributions may be made tc
a fuller knowledge of the conditions
ultimately responsible for vice. II
this experiment is successful, the
principle may prove applicable to al
classes Of criminals and the condi
lions precedent to crime, and lead tt
lines of action not only more scientific
and humane but also less wastefu
than those at present followed.
In entering upon it's labors, the Blu
reau regarded it of fundamental i'm
portance to make a careful study O
the social evil in this country and il
Europe. feeling that this problem, like
any other great and difficult one, cal
be in~telligently approached only b.
means of a thorough and complete
knowledge of all the factors involved