Little Falls herald. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1889-1950, 1913-03-14
Blame Men FOR
Their DOWNFALL
Residents Of Chicago Tender
Ioin Write Pathetic Letters.
WAIT LIKE WOLVES FOR PREY

illinois Vice Commission Receives
EpistIes Referring to Members as
Hypocrites, Afraid to Learn the
Truth-victims Ascrlbe Their Pres.
ent Life the Result Of Listening to
Lying Tempters and 6Iackguards.
Chicago, March 13.-Reformers and
the unreformed-the senatorial vice
investigation commission and the
women for whose moral downfall the
commission is trying to determine the
causes differed on the relation be.
tween low wages and low. morality.
Letters received by the commission
from women of the underworld
Knocked at the work which the mem
bers are doing.
One Of these letters, signed K. R.
L., reads:
ITO the Commission: Girls don't
go wrong because they are hungry or
because they need clothes. They go
wrong because they are tempted by
lies and overpowered by the evil in
men.
They listen to the fair and pretty
things that men tell them and they
fall because they think they can trust
themselves and trust the tempters. It
is not the employer. I was a good
girl and I worked in a store.
II didn't get much money, but that
didn't matter. lived on So a week
and would be living like that now
but I met men. They seemed to con-
slider me their prey and all the time
it was fight, fight. They wanted to
be nice to me, they said, and to take
me to the theater and treat me fair
and give me chance to enjoy life. -
Didn't Know Men Were Bad.
II didn't know men were bad-all
bad-where a girl IL concerned. I
thought only women were bad.
thought all a girl had to do to remain
good was to be truthful with herself.
God pity women who think that and
who keep their trust in men until 1t
is too late. Every day it was some
one else-always smiling at me, al
ways trying to give me fair, chance
to be happy. In the street they fol-
lowed me-these I could avoid-but'
the friends who hung around
"That is the big secret Of the thing
that makes a good girl bad. If they
had left me be-if they had only left
me be-only let me live as I wanted
to, I wouldn't have had to stink into
the room when your commission was
trying to solve things and wouldn't
have had to sit in corner with my
veil down, afraid to look good women
in the face"
Another cry from the underworld
echoed the words of the letter above.
It was more bitter, though, and 1t
reads in part:
you're looking for the things that
made such women as I. Low wages!
Dance halls! Hunger! Cold! They
all helped a bit, but they didn't turn
the trick themselves. You're all a
bunch Of hypocrites, afraid to look the
thing in the face and afraid to learn
the truth.
Hounded by 6Iackguards.
II don't know any girls who sold
themselves for money to buy bread or
clothes. But / know lots Of us who
hit the road for hell, because lot of
blackguards kept bounding them with
their rotten attentions God help the
men and not us. We're all right when
We start. All we need is to be left
alone. There are hundreds and hun
dreds Of kids and sports who hang
around State street and wait, like
wolves, for the tired girls to leave the
store.
"Why don't you make the men be
good? All the wages in the world