Daily Kennebec journal., 1913-11-10

| The following article is by the Rev.
C.. r. Aked, ID. D., LID. in the Bos-
ton American:
There is deep significance i'll the
| fact that it is women who reject the
policy to hush up. Men may seek to
walk in the old ways of concealment
land subterfugc. They will not sue
ceed For one good reason amongst
Imany-the women will not let them.
Miss Ida Green of the Young
Women's Christian Association tells
| the City Council of Oakland that the
play, "The Traffic" ought to so on
ought And she repeats and re-
iterates the ground of her demand:
A knowledge of the hideous facts
with which the play deals deepens
hatred of all that produces those evil
conditions and fosters them and gives
to them their hateful power. AL
most the entire story of the ciitrance
of women into conflict with vice is
| in Miss Green's contention. What
remains is hardly worth telling.
Let the facts be known Miss
Green said in effect to the Council,
and they will be hated. Let them
Dt Idttu anu tuGS Will W i''6'N'
Let them be fought, and victory
will rest with the forces of moral
Iity and clean living"
The Oakland City Council paid
no heed They prohibited the per-
formance of The Traffic But
they have not silenced Miss Green.
Neither will they and the like of
them silence the women who, in
every country in the civilized
world, agree with Miss Green and
demand that the vile things of
darkness shall be dragged into the
light, satisfied that when they are
seen and known for what they are
| the essential rightness' of our hu-
man nature wiik make an end of Them
Another illustration comes from
Hartford, CT. "A white slave traffic
prosecution nearly two years ago in
volved painful revelation. Tolera-
| ton of the social evil had ended in
making Hartford a recognized centre
of the traffic in girls. The mayor of
the city resolved upon a cleanup.
Houses of i'll fame We're closed. A
vice commission was appointed by the
mayor to inquire and. report with
| a view to the most drastic treat
ment of the evil which might seem
practical. The City Council re-
tfused to make an appropriation for
| the expense of the mayors COM
mission! Money was found by good
men and women, and the report was
issued last July.
The report was like every other
that has been issued within the last
ten years probably within the last
twenty. There has not been within
that period any thorough going. Sci
entific investigation of the social evil
conducted by a public body any
where in the world which has not
reported against liberation, against
| segregation, and in favor of suppress
sion. Tire Hartford commission re-
| ported that s'the policy of keaping the
houses closed must be rightly ad-
hered to- Funds were exhausted,
Only five hundred copies of the report
could be published Thee City Coun-
| ell refused to make an appropriation
for the circulation of the report. :
Then it was the turn of the wo7
men, The Woman Suffrage AS
sociation reprinted the report. and
placed it on sale at the Suffrage
headquarters in the midst of the
shopping district. Public sentiment
was aroused. The City Council was
i not-except to a policy of yet more
i mastery inactivity. A member of
the Council moved that the Coun-
Jcil register it's approval of the
policy of repression. Including his
Town. there were five votes cast
i for tho resolution-and twcnty-four
Iagainst, five out of twenty nine
were willing to go on record as
Iarmly opposed to tho municipal toler-
Iation of vice and loyalty anxious to
make war upon it.
But the Hartford City Council
had not done with the women. Out
side the suffrage headquarters in
Hartford there stands today-un-
less the policy of the hush-up has
i succeeded in defacing or destroy
ing it within the last week or two
Ia six-foot signboard with these
Il huge lines upon it;
MOTHERS Or HARTFORD!
lDo YOU KNOW HOW THE FOL-
Il LOWING MEMBERS OF THE
Il CITY COUNCIL,
WHO CLAIM TO REPRESENT
YOU, VOTED IN REGARD TO
THE SUPPRESSION OF
COMMERCIALIZED VICE?
And then followed the names OF
the twenty -four who love darkness
rather than light because theil
Thought is muddled.
Alongside this was another pla-
card: Come in and get PAM
phlet free, telling what the vote OF
these twenty-four men means tt
YOU"
L The significance of these things
must not be lost. The blindest re-
dictionary cannot afford to ignore
IL it. East and West are one, ano
there is no North or South in this
fine enthusiasm for the suppress,
sion of world wide wrong. Oak
land answers back to Hartford
, Denver to Atlanta, Minneapolis t.
: Mobile. The necessary eviP' talk
has bpeu heard for cpnturieS MeT