Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1927-04-10
Urges Way to Check Juvenile Crime

his attendance constantly checked up.
In this way parents would know that
in the afternoons their boys were
under competent leaders and were
being looked after. If this were done
in every school and high school of the
nation, how many boys would be
smoking cigarettes, or learning the
drug habit, or planning crime?
IF the energy of youth is daily eX-
hausted so that a boy is really tired
from healthy exercise he won't be
looking. for trouble. He will be look
ing for bed"
**
but what would you do about boys
going out at nights" ! asked.
Two answers to that" smiled Mr..
| Butcher. Parents should be com
| PEELED to make their boys join some
| kind of & boys society like the Y -
| c. A., the Boy Scouts and the like.
| Five nights of the week boys should
! be going to these clubs and taught
, how to study and how to enjoy good
social games We rarely hear of a
cadet at West Point or a midshipman
at Annapolis going wrong. Why?
| Because their time is fully taken up.
| There is no time for wrong doing.
| What we must do is to fully take up
the time of our boys. Then they will
| go straight | would, of course, let
| a boy out one night of a week to go
| where he pleased. But so long as we
| think boys in grammar schools and in
| high schools are old enough and wise
enough to know how to use their
| spare time profitably to themselves
we will continue to have jazz maf1iacs
and criminal Youths. Every youth
| should have his time fully taken up
/ he fe oir ~
| that time should be a training in
character and knowledge. I am
thinking of a remarkable experiment
| that happened in Chicago"
X X 4
What was that?" / inquired
| ''At the corner of Nineteenth and
| Leavitt in Chicago was the worst
section for juvenile crime in Chicago.
| Yearly there were thousands of win.
| dows broken on trains that passed
| through this danger zone by stones
| hurled from the hands of wanton
| boys Hundreds of street lamps were
| broken. Finally the Union League
| Club of Chicago decided to try an eX-
pertinent. They bought an old beer
| garden in this area and erected a
| 500, 900 clubhouse. They offered Ii
| to the boys of that neighborhood ii
| tncY WOuIu IOiIN II COIIliH unity Ciub'
| Members had to pay dues of cents
a month. In a years time crime in
! that neighborhood fell off rs per cent
according to a statement Of Judge
| Arnold, Chicago's most noted Juvenile
| Judge Instead of throwing rocks al
car windows or street lamps, boys
| began to aim at basket ball goals.
| The spare time of the boys was occu.
| pied and crime fell off amazingly,
| II feel that since the home is ut
| terly unable in it's new environment
| to any longer teach character
| the school should take over the spare
hours of boys and regulate them.
when boys come home for dinner
| it may be that they will not want tc
| go out at night. They may be toe
| tired. But if parents do not begin t.
| keep their boys at home at night and
disabuse themselves of the notion
! that any grammar school boy or high
| school boy is wise enough to take
care of himself, the State will have
to step in again and provide for the
regulation of the evenings of boys
uAder Is.
Regulate the spare hours of youI
| boy or the State is going to do il
for you That is the solution of our
terrible annual record in juvenile
crime"
! (Copyright 1927