Mann Act

The White-Slave Traffic Act, also called the Mann Act, is a United States federal law. It was passed June 25, 1910 (ch. 395, ; codified as amended at ). It is named after Congressman James Robert Mann of Illinois.
The act made it illegal to bring women or girls from one state into another for the purpose of "prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose," which means for them to have sex for money. The law was there to stop human trafficking. Most human trafficking was people taking young women from place to place for prostitution. The Mann Act was one of a group of laws about moral reform, during an era that was known as Progressive Era.
It had a problem though: the language used was often ambiguous or unclear. It was even used to make agreed sex between adults a crime. This was because people thought of sex as immoral if the two people were not married. Congress changed it twice, in 1978, and 1986, so that it would only be used for prostitution or other illegal sexual acts.
Promotion
In the 19th century, in many American cities, people could only sell sex for money in some areas of the city. These were called red light districts. During that time, cities became more urbanized; also more women started to work. This meant that there would be more cases, where courtship could take place without supervision. In this environment, a concern of "white slavery" started: the fear was that women would be kidnapped and forced into prostitution. In 1847, Charles Sumner had described the Barbary slave trade. The ideas originally were from this description.
Communities started to set up vice commissions, to look how widespread local prostitution was. They also looked into questions, if the prostitutes were forced, and if cartel-type organizations ran local prostitution. These commissions also closed the brothels and the red light districts. The laws in the cities, which were liberal at first became more and more restrictive. Throughout the last few decades of the 19th century, there was more and more opposiition to an open prostution on the streets. The Federal Government responded to this with the Mann Act. The purpose of the act was to make it a crime to "transport [...], or aid to assist in obtaining transportation for" or to "persuade, induce, entice or coerce" a woman to travel. Many of the changes that occurred after 1900 were a result of tensions between social ideals and practical realities. Family form and functions changed in response to a complex set of circumstances that were the effects of economic class and ethnicity.
According to historian Mark Thomas Connelly, a group of books and pamphlets appeared announcing a startling claim: There was a conspiracy, which trapped white girls, seduced them, and forced them into prostitution, or 'white slavery'. These stories started around 1909. They often wrote about innocent girls "victimized by a huge, secret and powerful conspiracy controlled by foreigners", as they were drugged or imprisoned and forced into prostitution.
This excerpt from The War on the White Slave Trade was written by the United States District Attorney in Chicago:
Connelly says that these issues were real problems that had been there for a long time. The concerns simply made them bigger. These issues came from the fact that many young girls from the countryside came into the cities looking for work. Some of them became prostitutes, because they were well-paid.. A number of Vice Commission reports had drawn attention to the issue. Some people of the time questioned the idea of abduction and foreign control of prostitution through cartels. Emma Goldman was a noted radical and feminist. She asked "What is really the cause of the trade in women? Not merely white women, but yellow and black women as well. Exploitation, of course; the merciless Moloch of capitalism that fattens on underpaid labor, thus driving thousands of women and girls into prostitution. With Mrs. Warren these girls feel, 'Why waste your life working for a few shillings a week in a scullery, eighteen hours a day?' ... Whether our reformers admit it or not, the economic and social inferiority of woman is responsible for prostitution." While prostitution was widespread, contemporary studies by local vice commissions indicate that it was "overwhelmingly locally organized without any large business structure, and willingly engaged in by the prostitutes."
Suffrage activists, especially Harriet Burton Laidlaw and Rose Livingston, took up the concerns. They worked in New York City's Chinatown and in other cities to rescue young white and Chinese girls from forced prostitution, and helped pass the Mann Act to make interstate sex trafficking a federal crime. Livingston publicly discussed her past as a prostitute and made the claim that she was abducted and developed a drug problem as a sex slave in a Chinese man's home, narrowly escaped, and experienced a Christian conversion. Although her claim was unsupported by evidence, her story exemplified the stereotypes used to pass the Mann Act--fear of foreigners, especially Chinese men; abduction and drugging in order to be raped and enslaved; a narrow escape; and salvation through Christian conversion. Other groups like the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and Hull House focused on children of prostitutes and poverty in community life while trying to pass protective legislation. The American Purity Alliance also supported the Mann Act.
Notable prosecutions under the Mann Act
References
Books and articles on the subject
Donovan, Brian. White Slave Crusades: Race, Gender, and Anti-vice Activism, 1887-1917. United States: University of Illinois Press, 2010. ISBN 978-0-252-09100-1.
Other websites
United States federal legislation