Prostitution a Necessary Social Institution of Bourgeois Society.
1.--Prostitution and Society.
Marriage constitutes one phase of the sex relations of bourgeois
society; prostitution constitutes the other. If men fail to find
satisfaction in marriage, they, as a rule, seek it with prostitution;
and those men who for one reason or another refrain from marrying,
seek satisfaction with prostitutes also. To those men then, who
voluntarily or involuntarily lead an unmarried life, and to those who
do not find their expectations realized in marriage, opportunities
for satisfaction of the sexual impulse are far more favorable than
to women.
Men have always regarded it as their “just” privilege to employ
prostitution. But they are relentless in condemning a woman who
is not a prostitute, when she has “fallen.” That natural impulses
are implanted in women as well as in men and that these manifest
themselves particularly strongly at certain periods of a woman’s
life, does not alter their judgment. By means of his ruling position
man compels woman to suppress her most powerful instincts, and makes
chastity the condition of her social position and of marriage. Nothing
can prove the dependent position of woman in a more emphatic and
revolting way than these vastly differing conceptions in regard to
the satisfaction of the same natural impulse.
Man is especially favored by conditions. The results of sexual
intercourse have been assigned to the woman by nature, while man has
the enjoyment only without trouble or responsibility. This natural
advantage of men over women has fostered the unbridled lust which
characterizes a great many men. But as a great many causes prevent or
limit the legitimate satisfaction of the sexual impulse the result
is its illegitimate satisfaction.
~Prostitution thus becomes a necessary social institution of bourgeois
society, just as the police, the standing army, the church and the
capitalist class.~ This is no exaggeration; we can prove it. We have
shown how prostitution was regarded as a necessary institution in
ancient society and how it was organized by the state in both Greece
and Rome. We have also shown what views prevailed in regard to it
during the Christian middle ages. Even St. Augustin who was, after
Paul, the staunchest pillar of Christianity and ardently preached
asceticism, could not refrain from exclaiming: “Suppress the public
prostitutes and the force of passion will overturn everything.”
St. Thomas Aquin, who is still considered the greatest authority
on theology, has expressed the same opinion more forcibly still by
saying: “Prostitution in the cities is like the cess-pool in the
palace; if you remove the cess-pool the palace will become an unclean
and evil smelling place.” The provincial council at Milan in 1665
held the same view. But let us consult some modern opinions.
Dr. F. S. Huegel says: “Advancing civilization will gradually clothe
prostitution in more pleasing forms, but only with the destruction of
the world will it come to an end!”[82] That is a bold assertion, but
whoever cannot think beyond the form of bourgeois society, whoever
does not admit that society will transform itself to attain healthful
and natural conditions, must agree with Dr. Huegel. M. Rubner, an
authority on hygiene, professor at the University of Berlin, and
director of the Hygienic Institute, expresses a similar opinion. He
says: “Prostitution of women has existed at all times and among all
peoples. It is indestructable because it serves the sexual impulse
and springs from human nature and because in many cases the tendency
to prostitution is due to an innate vice of some women. Just as we
find in every population geniuses beside idiots, giants besides
dwarfs, and other abnormities, so we also find by the chance of
birth abnormities which must lead to prostitution.”[83]
None of the above-named conceive the thought that a different social
order might remove the causes of prostitution, and none seek to
investigate the causes. Some who take up this problem faintly recognize
that unfortunate social conditions, weighing heavily upon countless
women, might be the chief cause why so many sell their bodies. ~But
they do not draw the conclusion that if this be the case, it becomes
necessary to bring about different social conditions.~ Among the
few who recognize that economic conditions form the chief cause of
prostitution is Th. Bade.[84] He says: “The causes of the boundless
moral degradation from which the prostitute girls emerge are founded
on ~social~ conditions. They are especially due to the decline of
the middle classes, particularly the artisan class, among whom only
very few continue to ply their trade independently.” Bade concludes
his observations by saying: “Material need which has destroyed many
middle class families and continues to destroy them also leads to
their moral degradation, especially to that of the female sex.”[85]
But prostitution is not an institution of nature that, as R. Schmoelder
says: “Will remain a constant companion of humanity,”[86] it is a
social institution without which we cannot conceive bourgeois society.
The police physician of Leipsic, Dr. J. Kuehn, says: “Prostitution
is not only a bearable, but a necessary evil. It protects women from
adultery (which only men have a right to commit--the author) and guards
virtue (of course the virtue of women because men are not required
to be virtuous--the author) against assault and destruction.”[87]
These words grossly characterize the incarnate selfishness of men.
Kuehn maintains the correct position of a police physician, whose
duty it is to guard men against unpleasant diseases by the police
surveillance of prostitution. Only the man is taken into consideration
to whom celibacy is horrible and a torture, but the millions of
women doomed to celibacy must content themselves. What is considered
right in the man’s case, is considered wrong, immoral and criminal
in the woman’s.
Another interesting gentleman is Dr. Fock, who regards prostitution
as a “necessary correlation of our civilization.”[88] He fears an
overproduction of human beings if all persons should marry after
having attained maturity, and therefore considers it important that
prostitution should be regulated by the state. He considers police
surveillance of prostitution justifiable, and that the State should
furnish men with prostitutes who are free from syphilis. He declares
himself in favor of closest surveillance of all women who can be
convicted of leading a disorderly life. But can this surveillance
be carried out, if ladies leading a disorderly life belong to the
upper classes? It is the old story. Dr. Fock also recommends that
a tax should be levied upon prostitutes and that they should be
confined to certain streets. In other words, the ~Christian state~
should make prostitution a source of income by state organization
and protection of vice in the interest of men.
Dr. Henry Severus,[89] who also favors legal recognition of
prostitution maintains an original point of view. He regards it
as a useful institution, because it is a necessary correlation of
marriage, and that without it the free choice in marriage would be
impaired. According to him prostitution is a sort of safety-valve
of bourgeois society. He claims: “Much of the poverty that leads
to such deplorable social conditions may be traced to the fact,
that marriages are recklessly contracted, without questioning how
the necessary means of livelihood might be obtained. It is in the
interest of the state, that such marriages should not be contracted,
for the children that spring from them cannot be sufficiently provided
for by their parents, nor do they belong in the foundling hospital,
being legitimate children, and thus become ~a peril to society~.
Prostitution,” he goes on to say, “prevents that the force of natural
instinct should lead to the contracting of marriages that result in
an ~increase of those elements of the population~ who, owing to lack
of education and an unfortunate childhood, ~developes sentiments
that are hostile to the state and become enemies of society~.” So
according to this, state regulation of vice furnishes a protection
and a remedy against socialism--a view that may at least lay claim
to originality.
So we may reiterate our assertion, prostitution is a necessary social
institution of bourgeois society, just as the police, the standing
army, the church and the capitalist class.
[82] F. Huegel.--History, Statistics and Regulation of Prostitution
in Vienna, 1865.
[83] Max Rubner--Text Book of Hygiene. Leipsic, 1907.
[84] Th. Bade. Procurers and public dance halls.
[85] Statistics gathered by the Berlin police in 1871–72 concerning
the parentage of 2,224 enrolled prostitutes showed the following
figures: 1,015 equal 47.9 per cent. came from the artisan class;
467 equal 22.0 per cent. were daughters of factory laborers; 305
equal 14.4 per cent. of minor officials; 222 equal 10.4 per cent.
of merchants, etc.; 37 equal 4.1 per cent. of farmers, and 26 equal
1.2 per cent of military men. With 102 the father’s profession could
not be determined.
[86] R. Schmoelder, Punishment of fornication as a trade.
[87] J. Kuehn. Prostitution in the nineteenth century from the
standpoint of police sanitation.
[88] Dr. Fock--Prostitution in its ethical and sanitary aspect.
[89] Dr. H. Severus--Prostitution and the state.
2.--Prostitution and the State.
State supervision and organization of prostitution does not exist
in the German empire as it does in France; prostitution is merely
tolerated. Disorderly houses are prohibited by law and procurers may
be severely punished. But notwithstanding these laws in many German
cities, among others in Mayence, Magdeburg, Altona, Kiel, Nuremberg,
Worms, Freiburg, Leipsic, Regensburg, Hamburg, Augsburg, Wuerzburg,
disorderly houses exist that are tolerated by the police.[90] This
seems an incredible state of affairs and its contradiction to the
laws must be well known to our government officials. According to
German law, persons renting an apartment to a prostitute are subject
to punishment. On the other hand, the police are obliged to tolerate
thousands of prostitutes and to protect them in their trade if they
submit to the prescribed rules, for instance, to regular examination
by a physician. But if the state makes concessions to prostitutes
and supports them in the plying of their trade, it is necessary for
them to have a residence also; in fact, it becomes necessary to
public health and order that their trade should be carried on in
definite quarters. What contradictions! On the one hand the state
officially recognizes prostitution; on the other hand it persecutes
and punishes prostitutes and procurers. Moreover, this attitude
of the state confirms, that to modern society, prostitution is a
sphynx whose riddle it cannot solve. Religion and morality condemn
prostitution, the laws punish it, and yet the state tolerates and
protects it. In other words, our society that prides itself on its
morality, its piety, its civilization and culture must suffer itself
to be polluted by the slow poison of immorality and corruption. Still
another conclusion follows from these conditions: ~the Christian state
admits that marriage is insufficient and that the man is justified
in seeking illegitimate satisfaction of the sexual impulse~. The
woman is taken into consideration by this same state only, inasmuch
as she yields to the illegitimate satisfaction of male lust, that
is, becomes a prostitute. The police supervision and control of
enlisted prostitutes does not include the men who mingle with the
prostitutes, which ought to be a matter of course if the medical
surveillance were to be partly effective at least, quite disregarding
the fact that justice demands that the law should be equally applied
to both sexes.
This protection of the man from the woman by the state overturns
the nature of conditions. It appears as if men were the weaker, and
women the stronger sex, as if women were the seducer, and poor, weak
man the seduced. The myth of temptation of Adam and Eve in Paradise
continues to influence our conceptions and laws and sustains the
Christian assumption, that “woman is the great seducer, the source
of sin.” Men ought to be ashamed of the pitiable and unworthy part
they are playing, but it is pleasing to them to be regarded as “weak”
and as “victims of seduction” for ~the more they are protected the
more they may sin~.
Wherever men come together in great numbers, they do not seem to be
able to enjoy themselves without prostitution. That was seen among
other instances by the occurrences at the rifle match in Berlin during
the summer of 1890. These occurrences caused 2,300 women to sign a
petition to the mayor of the German capital, which read as follows:
“We beg your honor to permit our quoting what has been reported in
regard to this festival by the press and other sources. These reports,
which we read with the greatest indignation and disgust, among other
things thus described the entertainments provided at the festival:
‘First, German Herold, greatest Café Chantant of the world’; hundred
ladies and forty gentlemen; besides small variety shows and rifle
ranges from which exceedingly obtrusive women molested the men;
furthermore free concerts, where lightly garbed waitresses boldly
and unrestrained, with seductive smiles forced their attentions
alike on men and youths, on college boys and fathers of families.
But the ‘lady’ who was almost nude and who invited them to visit
the booths ‘The Secrets of Hamburg, or a Night in St. Pauli,’ might
at least have been removed by the police. But the worst, something
that plain men and women from the provinces can hardly accredit to
the far-famed capital of the empire, was the fact that the committee
on arrangements had permitted, that instead of waiters, young women
in great numbers were engaged as waitresses and bar-maids without
pay. We German women, as mothers, wives and sisters, frequently have
occasion to send our brothers, husbands, sons and daughters to Berlin
in service of the fatherland, and so we beg your honor, trusting
to your influence as chief executive of the national capital to
investigate these occurrences and to prevent a repetition of these
orgies, especially at the forthcoming celebration of the victory at
Sedan.”
During all large festivals, including the national ones, when men
come together in great numbers, similar scenes occur.[91]
The German governments made frequent attempts to do away with the
contradiction that exists between the legal theories and actual
practice in regard to prostitution. They introduced bills among
other things, which authorized the police to assign definite places
of residence to the prostitutes. It was admitted that prostitution
could not be suppressed and that it would therefore be better to
limit it to certain places and to control it. Such a law--on this
all were agreed--would have reinstated the public brothels that had
been officially abolished in Prussia during the forties of the last
century. The introduction of these bills caused great excitement
and aroused much protest. It was stated that the state by extending
protection to vice spread the opinion that prostitution was not
averse to morality and was an officially sanctioned trade. These
bills that met with much opposition in Parliament, have until now,
remained unsettled. But their very introduction shows the predicament
of the state.
State regulation and control of vice not only create the belief
among men that the state favors prostitution, it also leads them
to believe that this regulation protects them from disease, and
this belief makes men more reckless and increases the employment of
prostitution. Public brothels do not diminish sexual diseases, they
promote them, because ~men become more reckless and careless~. To
what conceptions the official protection of brothels leads may be
seen from the term applied to the licensed prostitutes in England,
who were called “Queen’s women” because they had obtained official
recognition through a law enacted by the queen. Experience has
taught, that neither the introduction of public brothels under
police supervision nor regular medical examination insure safety
from contagion.
To an inquiry from the woman’s committee of Vienna for combatting the
state regulation of vice Dr. Albert Eulenburg wrote as follows: “In
regard to the question of police supervision of prostitutes I fully
share, as a matter of principle, the point of view set forth in your
petition, though, of course I recognize the practical difficulty of
its immediate application. I regard this practice which has been
introduced in most countries as unjust, unworthy, and moreover as
entirely unsuited to attain the object stated with any certain degree
of safety.” On July 20, 1892, the Berlin Medical Society declared
that the reinstatement of public brothels would be undesirable,
both from a hygienic and moral point of view.
The nature of these diseases is such that in many cases it cannot
be recognized easily, or at once, and to attain a certain degree of
safety several daily examinations would be necessary. But this is
impossible, owing to the great number of women in question and the
large expense it would entail. Where 30 to 40 prostitutes have to be
examined in one hour, the examination is nothing more than a farce,
and in the same way one or two weekly examinations are entirely
insufficient. Dr. Blaschko[92] says: “The belief, that control of
prostitutes furnishes protection against contagion, unfortunately
is a widespread and detrimental error. Rather can it be asserted
that everyone who associates with a prostitute or a frivolous girl
faces a grave danger each time.”
The success of these measures fails also because the men who carry
the germs of disease from one woman to another remain entirely free
from control. A prostitute who has just been examined and found
healthy may become infected by a diseased man in the very same hour,
and before the next examination takes place, or before she herself
has become aware of the disease, she may have infected a number
of other visitors. The control is an imaginary one. Besides the
obligatory examinations by male instead of female physicians deeply
injure the sense of modesty and help to destroy it completely. This
statement is confirmed by a great many physicians who perform such
examinations.[93] The same is admitted even in the official report
of the Berlin police department, where it says it must be admitted
~that official enrollment still increases the moral degradation of
those affected by it~.[94] ~The prostitutes do whatever they can to
escape this control.~
Another evil result of these measures is, that it is made very
difficult, indeed almost impossible to prostitutes, to return to
a decent means of livelihood. ~A woman who has fallen into police
control is lost to society; as a rule she miserably perishes after
a few years.~ The fifth congress for combatting immorality, held in
Geneva, thus expressed itself forcibly and correctly against the
state regulation of vice: “The obligatory medical examination of
prostitutes is a cruel punishment to the woman, for in those who are
subjected to it the last remnant of modesty that may still exist in
the most depraved, is forcibly destroyed. The state that seeks to
regulate prostitution by police control forgets that it owes equal
protection to both sexes, it degrades and demoralizes the woman.
Every system of official regulation of vice permits of arbitrary
police rule and leads to the infringement of personal safety against
arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, against which even the lowest
criminal is guarded. As these encroachments occur only at the expense
of the woman, they lead to an unnatural inequality between her and
the man. The woman is degraded to a mere object and is no longer
treated as a person. ~She is excluded from the law.~”
How little police and medical control avail has been strikingly shown
in England. Before the beginning of official regulation, in the year
1867, the number of venereal diseases in the army were, according
to a military report, 91 per 1,000. In 1886, after the regulation
had been in effect for nineteen years they were 110 per 1,000. In
1892, six years after the regulation laws had been repealed they were
only 79 per 1,000. Among civilians the cases of syphilis were 10 per
1,000 during the years 1879 to 1882, that was during the years of
public regulation. After the abolition of public regulation, from
1885 to 1889 they were only 8.1 per 1,000.
The prostitutes themselves were far more affected by the regulation
laws than the soldiers. In 1866 there were among 1,000 prostitutes,
121 cases of disease. In 1868 after the law had been in force for
two years there were 202 cases among 1,000. After that the number
gradually decreased, but in 1874 there still were 16 cases more per
thousand than in 1866. The death rate among prostitutes also increased
appallingly during the reign of that law. When at the close of the
sixties of the last century the English government attempted to
extend the regulation laws to include all English cities, a storm of
indignation arose among English women. They regarded the law as an
insult to their entire sex. The habeas corpus, they claimed, that
fundamental law which guaranteed protection to every English citizen,
was to be abolished for women; every brutal police officer impelled
by revenge or other base motives, would be permitted to attack the
most respectable woman if he suspected her of being a prostitute,
while the licentiousness of men would not be interfered with, but
would on the contrary be protected and fostered by law.
The fact that English women under the leadership of Josephine Butler
championed the most degraded of their sex, caused ignorant men to
misconstrue their intentions and to make insulting remarks about them.
But regardless of these attacks they opposed the extension of the
obnoxious law with utmost energy. In newspaper articles and pamphlets
arguments in favor of it and against it were fully discussed, until
its extension was prevented, and in 1886 is was repealed.[95]
The German police has a similar power, and sometimes cases have been
called to public attention in Berlin, Leipsic, Cologne, Hannover
and many other places, showing that abuses or “misunderstandings”
easily occur with the exercise of this power, but not much is heard
among us of an energetic opposition to such transgressions.[96] In
Norway, brothels were ~prohibited~ in 1888, and in the capital,
Christiania, the obligatory registration of prostitutes and the
medical examination connected with it was ~abolished~. ~In January,
1893, the same ordinance was enacted for the entire country.~ Very
correctly Mrs. Guillaume-Shack says in regard to state “protection”
for men: “To what purpose do we teach our sons to respect virtue
and morality if the state declares vice to be a necessary evil; if
young men, before they have even attained intellectual maturity,
are given women stamped like commodities by the public authorities
as playthings of their passions?”
A man inflicted with a sexual disease may indulge in unbridled
licentiousness and may infect any number of these unfortunate beings,
most of whom have been driven by seducers or by bitterest need into
this abominable trade. The law leaves him unmolested. But woe to the
poor, diseased prostitute who does not immediately submit to medical
treatment! The garrison towns, university towns and sea port towns,
where many strong, healthy men aggregate, are the chief centers of
prostitution and its dangerous diseases, which are disseminated
all over the land and everywhere spread suffering and destruction.
The moral qualification of a great number of our students is
described in the following manner in the “Gazette for Combatting
Public Immorality”[97]: “Among a majority of the students the views
concerning moral questions are appallingly base, almost depraved.”
From these circles that boast about their “German spirit” and “German
morals,” our public officials, prosecutors and judges are obtained.
How bad matters must be, especially among students, may be seen from
the following: In the fall of 1901, a large group of professors and
physicians, among them leading men in their professions, published
an appeal to German students, in which they called special attention
to the deplorable results of sexual debauchery, and also warned the
young men of excessive indulgence in alcoholic drinks, which in many
cases have a stimulating influence on sexual debauchery. At last
people are beginning to recognize that the policy of silence is a
mistaken one, and that we must call a spade a spade, if we would
check an immeasurable disaster. Among other classes of society also
this warning should not remain unheeded.
The Biblical utterance that the sins of the fathers shall be visited
upon their children applies in its fullest measure to the man afflicted
with a sexual disease; unfortunately also to his innocent wife.
“Apoplectic strokes among young men and women, forms of paralysis
of the spine and softening of the brain, various nervous diseases,
weakening of the eye sight, inflammation of the bowels, sterility
and general debility are frequently due to no other cause than a
neglected case of syphilis, that has, for good reasons been kept
secret. As conditions are to-day ignorance and carelessness transform
blooming daughters of the nation into weak and sickly creatures
who must pay with chronic diseases for the extravagances of their
husbands before and outside of marriage.”[98] Dr. A. Blaschko says
among other things: “Epidemics like cholera, small pox, diphtheria
and typhoid terrify the people, because the suddenness of the
results are clearly visible to everybody. But syphilis is regarded
by society with an appalling indifference. And yet syphilis is far
more widespread and much more terrible in its effects than any of
the above-mentioned diseases.”[99] The fact that we regard it as
“indecent” to discuss such matters, accounts for this indifference.
Even the German diet could not bring itself to provide legally for
the treatment of persons afflicted with sexual diseases by means of
the sick benefit funds, as in the case of other diseases.[100]
The poison of syphilis is the most tenacious and the hardest to
eradicate of all poisons. Many years after the disease has been
apparently cured the evil results frequently manifest themselves in
the wife of the diseased or in his new-born children, and countless
sicknesses of married women and children are due to the sexual
diseases of husbands and fathers. In a petition addressed to the
German Parliament in the fall of 1899 by the society “Jugendschutz”
(protection of the young) it was stated that there are about 30,000
children in Germany who are blind from birth due to contagion from
gonorrhoea, and that among 50 per cent of childless women, sterility
is due to the same cause.[101] As a matter of fact an alarmingly
large number of marriages is childless, and moreover the number of
childless marriages is increasing. Feeble-mindedness and idiocy among
children is also not infrequently due to the same cause, and many
instances have shown what disasters can be caused with vaccination by
a single drop of blood inoculated with the poison of syphilis. The
great number of persons suffering from a sexual disease has caused
several suggestions to be made for the enactment of a national law
providing special treatment for persons so afflicted. But until now
no such step was taken, probably because one feared the enormity of
the evil that would then become manifest. Medical authorities have
generally gained the conviction, that gonorrhoea, which was formerly
regarded as harmless, is one of the most dangerous of these diseases.
This disease continues to act upon the human system even after it
has been apparently cured. As Dr. Blaschko reported in a lecture
in Berlin on the 20th of February, 1898, the medical examinations
of prostitutes reveal only one-fourth, or at best one-third of the
actual number of cases. As a matter of fact, the overwhelmingly great
majority of prostitutes are afflicted with this disease, while only
a small percentage of the cases are properly diagnosed. Of those in
whom the disease is recognized it is again only a small percentage
with whom a permanent cure is effected. Here society is confronted by
an evil for which it has no remedy as yet, but which is an imminent
peril to mankind, especially to its female half.
[90] Paul Kampffmeyer--Prostitution as a social class phenomenon
and the social and political struggle against it.
[91] “When the Farmers’ Association convenes in the Circus Bush, or
large conventions are being held in Berlin, there is a rise in price
of human flesh.” Satyr--Life at Night in the Friedrich Strasse,
Berlin, 1907.
[92] Handbook of Hygiene, published by Th. Weyl, M. D. Hygiene of
Prostitution and Venereal Diseases, compiled by Dr. A. Blaschko,
Berlin.
[93] “As a matter of fact the system of regulation does not
successfully fight the venereal diseases, nor even noticeably diminish
them. The delusive feeling of safety given to men makes them more
reckless. The increase in the number of correlation heightens the
danger of contagion by at least as much as it has been diminished by
the removal of a few who were seriously diseased.” August Forel--The
Sex Question, Munich, 1907.
[94] Third report of the royal police department of Berlin for the
years 1881 to 1890.
[95] The most reliable supporters of the women were the English
workingmen. In her famous publication on “The History of a Crusade,”
Josephine Butler says: “We resolved to appeal to the nation. In the
fall of 1869 we sent personal letters to every member of Parliament
of both houses and to many other leaders of political and religious
parties. Of all the replies received only very few expressed
complete agreement with our point of view. As we obtained so little
encouragement from those circles whose interest we had hoped to
win, we turned to the working class population of the country. I am
conscious of the fact that the working class has its faults and is
no less devoid of egotism than other classes of the population. But
I am firmly convinced that when the people are appealed to in the
name of justice they almost invariably show a loyal and reliable
conviction.”
[96] In 1901 it occurred in Vienna that a French lady was abused
by the police agent, Newhofer, amidst the shouts of a mob, was
imprisoned among prostitutes and subjected to a forcible medical
examination. This case led to five interpellations in the diet. In
1902 in Hamburg and Kiel ladies were arrested as prostitutes and
were treated with brutality. These occurrences led to a gigantic
meeting of protest in Hamburg on September 8, that was attended by
members of all parties.
[97] August 15, 1893, Berlin.
[98] The detrimental results of prostitution. Dr. Oscar Lassar,
Berlin, 1892, August Hirschwald.
[99] Treatment of sexual diseases in sick benefit fund institutions
and hospitals, Berlin, 1890.
[100] The ordinance of the insurance laws which enabled communities to
refuse the payment of sick benefits in cases of sexual diseases was
repealed by a law on May 25, 1903, that went into effect January 1,
1904.
[101] Examinations in asylums for the blind showed that the
following number of persons were blind from birth through infection:
Berlin, 21.3; Vienna, 31; Breslau, 35.1; Budapest, 47.9; Munich,
73.8.--Th. Weyl, Social Hygiene, Jena, 1904.
3.--The White Slave Trade.
As the number of men increases who refrain from marriage, be it
by choice or under the pressure of circumstances, and who seek
illegitimate satisfaction of the sexual impulse, the temptations
and opportunities for illegitimate satisfaction increase likewise.
Because immoral enterprises yield high profits many unscrupulous
persons are engaged in them, and resort to the craftiest methods
to attract customers. Every requirement of the patrons according
to position and rank and means is taken into consideration. If the
public brothels could reveal their secrets, it would become known that
their inmates, who are of lowly birth, ignorant and uneducated, but
possessed of physical charms, have intimate relations with educated
and cultured men who occupy prominent social positions. Here they
freely come and go, public officials, military men, representatives
of the people, judges, the aristocracy of birth and finance, of
commerce and industry. Many of these men are regarded as upholders
of public morality and guardians of the sanctity of marriage and the
family, and some are leaders of Christian charitable undertakings
and members of organizations “to combat prostitution.” In Berlin,
the owner of one of these establishments serving immoral purposes
even publishes an illustrated gazette, in which the doings of his
patrons are described. In this establishment 400 persons can be
seated, and every evening a fashionable gathering assembles there,
among them (so the gazette tells us) many members of the aristocracy.
Frequently well known actresses and famed belles of the demi-monde
are present. The merriment reaches its height when in the wee hours
of the morning the proprietors arrange an eel-catching tournament.
Then the fair patronesses squat about the tanks with their clothes
tucked up and try to catch the eel, and so forth. The police is well
aware of these doings, but carefully refrains from interfering with
the amusements of fashionable society. The following circular, sent by
the management of a Berlin dancing establishment to fashionable men,
is another shameless form of pandering. It reads: “The undersigned
management of the hunting establishment to whom you, dear sir, have
been recommended as a passionate hunter, beg to call your attention
to a newly-opened hunting ground with a splendid stock of deer and to
invite you to the first chase on August 26th. Special circumstances
make our new hunting grounds particularly convenient and pleasant:
they are located in the heart of the city and the game-laws are not
enforced.” Our bourgeois society is like a great masquerade in which
all seek to deceive one another. Every one wears his official gown
with dignity, while inofficially he indulges his passions without
restraint. Yet, outwardly, all feign decency, religiousness and
morality. In no age was hypocrisy as widespread as in ours.
The supply of women for immoral purposes increases faster than the
demand. Unfavorable social conditions, poverty, seduction, and the fact
that many women are attracted by the outward glitter of an apparently
free life, help to furnish victims from all strata of society. In a
novel by Hans Wachenhusen[102] we find a characteristic description
of the conditions that prevail in the German capital. The author
thus describes the purpose of his novel: “My book especially tells
of the victims of the female sex and their increasing depreciation
as a result of our unnatural social conditions, partly through their
own fault, partly through a neglected education and the love of
luxury. It tells of the surplus of this sex that makes the lives of
those, who are born and grow up, more hopeless each day. I wrote
as a public prosecutor might write, who had gathered data from the
life of a criminal to determine his guilt. If a novel is supposed
to be drawn from imagination, then the following is not a novel,
but a faithful portrayal of life.” In Berlin conditions are neither
better nor worse than in other large cities. Whether orthodox
St. Petersburg or Catholic Rome, Christian Berlin, or heathenish
Paris, Puritan London or frivolous Vienna is more nearly like ancient
Babylonia, it is hard to determine. Similar social conditions bring
forth similar results. “Prostitution has its written and unwritten
laws, its resources, its various resorts from the lowliest, to the
glittering palace, its countless degrees from the lowest to the
most cultured and refined. It has its special amusements and its
special places of meeting, its police, its hospitals, its prisons
and its literature.”[103] “We no longer celebrate the festivals of
Osiris, the Bacchanalia and the Indian orgies in the spring month,
but in Paris and other large cities in the darkness of night behind
the walls of public and private houses, orgies and Bacchanalia take
place that beggar description.”[104]
Under such conditions the traffic in women assumes huge dimensions.
It is carried on in the midst of civilization on a large scale
and in a well organized manner, and is but rarely detected by the
police. An army of male and female jobbers, agents and transporters
carry on the trade in as cold-blooded a manner as if they were
bartering a commodity. Certificates are made out that contain an
exact description and qualification of the various “pieces” and are
handed to the transporters as a bill of lading for the customer. As
with all merchandise, the price varies according to the quality,
and the “goods” are assorted and shipped from different places and
countries according to the taste and requirements of the customers.
By skilful manipulations the traders seek to escape the pursuit
of the police, and sometimes large sums are employed to bribe the
guardians of law and order. A number of such cases have been revealed
in Paris.[105]
To Germany belongs the deplorable reputation of being a market for
women to half the world. The rambling spirit, which is innate in the
German people, also seems to affect a portion of the German women,
so that they furnish a larger quota to international prostitution
than the women of other nations, with the exception of Austria and
Hungary. German women populate the harems of the Turks and the
public brothels in the interior of Siberia and as far as Bombay,
Singapore, San Francisco and Chicago. In his book on travel “From
Japan, through Siberia to Germany,” the author, W. Joest, says the
following about the German white-slave trade: “In our moral Germany,
people often grow indignant over the slave trade carried on by some
negra sovereign in western Africa, or over conditions in Cuba or
Brazil, while we ought to consider the beam in our own eye. In no
other country of the world white slaves are bartered to the same
extent, from no other countries are such large quantities of this
living merchandise shipped as from Germany and Austria. The course
taken by these girls can be clearly traced. From Hamburg they are
shipped to South America, Bahie, Rio de Janeiro; the greater part are
bound for Montevideo and Buenos Ayres, while a few go through the
Straits of the Magellan to Valparaiso. Another stream is directed over
England to North America, but there competition with the domestic
product is unfavorable to the trade, so the girls are shipped down
the Mississippi to Texas and Mexico. From New Orleans the coasts down
to Panama are furnished. Other troops of girls are sent across the
Alps to Italy and on to Alexandria, Suez, Bombay, even to Hongkong
and Shanghai, Dutch India and eastern India, especially Japan are
poor markets, because Holland will not tolerate white girls of this
sort in its colonies, and because in Japan the native girls are far
too pretty and cheap. Moreover, the trade must reckon with American
competition from San Francisco. Russia is supplied by eastern Prussia,
Pomerania and Poland. The first station is Riga. Here the dealers
from St. Petersburg and Moscow assort their merchandise and send it
in great quantities to Nishny Novgorod across the Ural Mountains
to Irbit and Krestowsky and even into the interior of Siberia. In
Tschita, for instance, I met a German girl who had been traded in
this way. This trade is thoroughly organized--agents and traveling
salesmen carry on the negotiations. ~If the foreign office of the
German Empire would ask its consuls for reports on this trade
interesting tables might be compiled.~”
That this traffic is flourishing, has been repeatedly stated by
Socialist deputies in the German Parliament.
Other centers of the white-slave trade are Galicia and Hungary, from
where women are sent to Constantinople and other Turkish cities.
Especially many Jewesses, who are otherwise rarely met with in public
brothels are bartered to the Turks. The prices for the journey and
other expenses are usually paid to the agents in advance. In order
to deceive the public authorities, fictitious telegrams, that are
not likely to attract attention, are sent to the customer. Some of
these telegrams read: “Five kegs of Hungarian wine will arrive in
Varna to-morrow,” meaning five beautiful girls; or “Have shipped
three barrels of potatoes by S. S. Minerva.” This refers to three
less beautiful girls: “Common goods.” Another telegram reads: “Will
arrive next Friday per S. S. Kobra; have two bales of fine silk on
board.”
[102] “What the street engulfs.” Social novel in 3 vols., Berlin.
A. Hoffmann & Co.
[103] Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell--The Moral Education.
[104] Mantegazza--L’Amour Dans L’Humanitè.
[105] The relation of the police to prostitution is an interesting
one in more than one respect. In 1899 it was shown in a trial in
Berlin that a police commissioner employed a prostitute to watch
and question a student whom he suspected of being an anarchist. In
Prague the wife of a common policeman had her license for maintaining
a disorderly house revoked because her husband had ill-treated a
prisoner. So the police rewards its officers by giving them licenses
for the maintenance of disorderly houses. What lovely conditions!
4.--The Increase of Prostitution.--Illegitimate Motherhood.
It is difficult to estimate the number of prostitutes--impossible
to determine it exactly. The police may approximately determine the
number of women for whom prostitution is the sole or chief source
of income, but they ~can not~ determine the far greater number of
those who resort to prostitution as a partial support. Nevertheless
the numbers that have been determined are enormous. According to
Oettingen at the close of the sixties of the last century the number
of prostitutes in London was estimated to be 80,000. In Paris on
January 1, 1906, the number of enrolled prostitutes was 6,196, but
more than one-third of these manage to evade police and medical
control. In 1892 there were about 60 public brothels in Paris,
harboring from 600 to 700 prostitutes; in 1900 there were only 42.
Their number is constantly decreasing (In 1852 there were 217 public
brothels). At the same time the number of private prostitutes has
greatly increased. An investigation, undertaken by the municipal
council of Paris in 1889, estimated that the number of women who
sell their bodies had reached the enormous figure of 120,000. The
chief of police of Paris, Léfrine, estimates the number of enrolled
prostitutes at 6,000 and the number of private prostitutes at 70,000.
During the years 1871 to 1903 the police inhibited 725,000 harlots
and 150,000 were imprisoned. During the year 1906, the number of
those who were inhibited amounted to no less than 56,196.[106]
The following numbers of prostitutes were enrolled with the Berlin
police: In 1886, 3006; in 1890, 4,039; in 1893, 4,663; in 1897,
5,098; in 1899, 4,544, and in 1905, 3,287. In 1890 six physicians
were employed, who performed examinations for two hours daily. Since
then the number of physicians has been increased to twelve, and
since several years a female physician has been employed to perform
these examinations, notwithstanding the objections of many male
physicians. In Berlin, as in Paris, the enrolled prostitutes only
constitute a small fraction of the entire number, that authorities on
this subject have estimated to be at least 50,000. In the single year
1890 there were 2,022 waitresses in the cafés of Berlin, who, with
very few exceptions were given to prostitution. The yearly increase
in the number of harlots inhibited by the police also shows that
prostitution in Berlin is growing. The numbers of those inhibited
were: In 1881, 10,878; in 1890, 16,605; in 1896, 26,703: in 1897,
22,915. In the year 1907 17,018 harlots were brought to trial before
the magistrates, which was about 57 for each day the court was in
session.
How large is the number of prostitutes throughout Germany? Some claim
that there are about 200,000. Stroehmberg estimates the number of
enrolled and private prostitutes in Germany to be between 75,000 and
100,000. In 1908 Kamillo K. Schneider attempted to determine the
exact number of enrolled prostitutes. His table for the year 1905
includes 79 cities. “As besides these there are other large places
in which a considerable number of girls may be found, he believes
15,000 to be a fairly correct estimate of the entire number. With a
population of approximately 60,600,000 inhabitants that means one
enrolled prostitute for 4,040 inhabitants.” In Berlin there is one
prostitute for 608, in Breslau for 514, in Hannover for 529, in Kiel
for 527, in Danzig for 487, in Cologne for 369, and in Brunswick for
363 inhabitants. The number of enrolled prostitutes is constantly
decreasing.[107] According to various estimates the ratio of the
number of public controlled prostitutes is to the number of private
prostitutes, as 1 to 5, or 1 to 10. We are, accordingly dealing with
a vast army of those to whom prostitution is a means of subsistence,
and conformably great is the number of victims claimed by disease
and death.
That the great majority of prostitutes grows thoroughly tired of
their mode of life, that it even becomes revolting to them, is an
experience on which all authorities are agreed. But very few of those
who have fallen victims to prostitution ever find an opportunity
to escape from it. In 1899 the Hamburg branch of the British,
Continental and General Federation undertook an investigation among
prostitutes. Although only few answered the questions put to them,
these answers are quite characteristic. To the question “Would you
continue in this trade if you could find some other means of support?”
one replied, “What can one do when one is despised by all people?”
Another replied, “I appealed for help from the hospital”; a third,
“My friend released me by paying my debts.” All suffer from the
slavery of their liabilities to the brothel keepers. One gave the
information that she owed her landlady $175. Clothes, underwear,
finery, everything is furnished by the keepers at fabulous prices;
they are also charged the highest prices for food and drink. Besides,
they must pay the keeper a daily sum for their room. This rent amounts
to $1.50, $2 or $3 daily. One wrote that she was compelled to pay
her procurer from $5 to $6 daily. No keeper will permit a girl to
depart unless she has paid her debts. The statements made by these
girls also cast an unfavorable light on the actions of the police,
who side more with the brothel keepers than with the helpless girls.
In short, we here behold in the midst of Christian civilization, the
worst kind of slavery. In order to better maintain the interests of
their trade, the brothel keepers have even founded a trade paper
that is international in character.
The number of prostitutes increases at the same rate at which the
number of working women increases, who find employment in various
lines of trade at starvation wages. Prostitution is fostered by
the industrial crises that have become inevitable in bourgeois
society, and to hundreds of thousands of families mean bitter need
and desperate poverty. A letter sent by the chief of police, Bolton,
to a factory inspector on October 31, 1865, shows that during the
crisis of the English cotton industry caused by the Civil War in the
United States, the number of young prostitutes increased more than
during the preceding twenty-five years.[108] But not only working
girls fall victims to prostitution. Its victims are also recruited
from the “higher professions.” Lombroso and Ferrero quote Macé,[109]
who says of Paris: “The certificate of a governess of a higher or
lower grade is far less an assignment to a means of support than to
~suicide, theft and prostitution~.”
Parent-Duchatelet has at one time compiled statistics which showed
the following. Among 5,183 prostitutes there were 1,441 who were
driven to prostitution by utmost need and misery. 1,225 were orphans
and poor. 86 had become prostitutes to support old parents, young
brothers and sisters, or their own children. 1,425 had been deserted
by their lovers; 404 had been seduced by officers and soldiers and
had been carried off to Paris. 289 had been servant girls who were
seduced by their employers and subsequently discharged, and 280 had
come into Paris to seek employment.
Mrs. Butler, the ardent champion of the poorest and most unfortunate
of her sex, says: “Accidental circumstances, the death of a father
or a mother, unemployment, insufficient wages, poverty, false
promises, seduction, the laying of snares may have driven her into her
misfortune.” Very instructive is the information given by Karl Schneidt
in a pamphlet on “The Misery of Waitresses in Berlin,”[110] in regard
to the causes that drive so many of them to prostitution. He says
that a surprisingly large number of servant girls become waitresses,
which means in nearly all cases that they become prostitutes. Among
the answers Schneidt received to his list of questions that he
circulated among waitresses are the following: “Because I became
pregnant by my employer and had to support my child”; “because my
book of references was spoiled”; “because I could not earn enough
by sewing and such work”; “because I had been discharged from the
factory and could not find other employment”; “because my father died
and there were four younger ones at home,” etc. That servant girls,
who have been seduced by their employers, constitute a large quota
of the prostitutes is a well known fact. Dr. Max Taube[111] makes
some very incriminating statements concerning the great number of
seductions of servant girls by employers or their sons. The upper
classes also furnish their quota to prostitution. Here poverty is
not the cause, but seduction, the inclination to lead a frivolous
life, the love of dress and enjoyment. A pamphlet on “Fallen Girls
and Police Control”[112] contains the following statement in regard
to the prostitutes from these classes: “Horror stricken many a worthy
citizen, minister, teacher, public official or military man learns
that his daughter is secretly addicted to prostitution. ~If all these
daughters could be named a social revolution would have to take place,
or the public ideas concerning virtue and morality would be seriously
impaired.~” The high class prostitutes, the smart set among them,
are drawn from these circles. A great many actresses also owing to a
glaring disparity between their salary and the cost of their wardrobe,
are compelled to resort to this vile means of support.[113] The same
is true of many other girls who are employed as salesladies and in
similar positions. Many employers are so infamous that they seek
to justify low wages by hinting at the assistance from “friends.”
Seamstresses, dressmakers, milliners, factory workers numbering
many thousands are subjected to the same conditions. Employers and
their assistants, merchants, landed proprietors, etc., frequently
regard it as their privilege to make female workers and employees
subservient to their lusts. Our pious conservatives like to point
to the rural conditions in regard to morality as a sort of ideal
compared to the large cities and industrial districts. But whoever
is acquainted with the conditions knows that they are not ideal. We
find this opinion confirmed by a lecture delivered by the owner of
a knightly estate in the fall of 1889, which newspapers in Saxony
reported in the following manner:
“Grimma. Dr. v. Waechter, owner of a knightly estate, at a meeting
of the diocese which was held here delivered a lecture on ~sexual
immorality in our rural communities~, in which local conditions were
depicted in no favorable light. With great frankness the lecturer
admitted that the ~employers~ themselves, even the ~married~ ones,
frequently maintained intimate relations with their female employees,
and that the results of such relations were either atoned for by
a payment of money or were hidden from the eyes of the world by a
crime. Unfortunately it could not be denied, that immorality was
introduced into the rural districts not only by country girls who
had been employed in the cities as wet nurses and by boys who had
become demoralized while serving in the army, but also by ~educated
men~, by managers of the large estates and army officers, who come
into the country during manoeuvres. Dr. v. Waechter claims that here
in the country there actually are ~few girls who have attained their
seventeenth birthday without having fallen~.” The honest lecturer
had to pay for his love of truth by being socially ostracised by the
offended officers. Reverend Dr. Wagner had a similar experience when
he ventured to say some disagreeable truths to the landed proprietors
in his book on “Morality in the Country.”[114]
The majority of prostitutes are driven into their unfortunate trade
at an age at which they cannot be regarded as competent to judge
their actions. Among the women who secretly prostituted themselves
arrested in Paris from 1878 until 1887, 12,615 equal 46.7 per
cent. were minors. Of those arrested from 1888–1898, 14,072 equal
48.8 per cent. were minors. Le Pilleurs gives the following resumé
of the prostitutes of Paris, which is as concise as it is pathetic:
“Defloured at 16, prostituted at 17, afflicted with syphilis at
18.”[115] Among 846 newly enrolled prostitutes in Berlin in 1898
there were 229 minors. There were:
7 at the age of 15
21 “ “ “ “ 16
33 “ “ “ “ 17
59 “ “ “ “ 18
49 “ “ “ “ 19
66 “ “ “ “ 20[116]
In September, 1894, a scandalous affair was revealed in Budapest,
where it became known that about 400 girls not more than fifteen
years of age had become the victims of rich libertines. The sons of
our “propertied and cultured classes” not infrequently consider it
their right to seduce the daughters of the poor and then to forsake
them. These confiding, inexperienced daughters of the poor, whose
lives are often devoid of all joy and who sometimes have no friend
or relative to protect them, easily fall victims to the art of the
seducer, who approaches them with all the temptations of pleasure and
affection. Bitter disappointments and despair and eventually crime
are the results. Among 2,060,973 children born in Germany in 1907
179,178 were illegitimate. One can imagine the amount of care and
heart-ache that the births of these illegitimate children mean to
their mothers, even if some of them are legally married later on by
the fathers of their children. ~Infanticide and the suicide of women
are in a great many cases caused by the misery and need of forsaken
women.~ The trials for infanticide present a sombre but instructive
picture. In the fall of 1894 a young woman was on trial in Krems,
Austria. Eight days after her confinement she had been discharged
from the lying-in hospital in Vienna, with her infant and penniless,
and being desperate she had killed her child. ~She was condemned to
death.~ In the spring of 1899 the following was reported from the
province of Posen: “On Monday last the 22-year-old working girl,
Katherine Gorbacki, from Alexanderruh, near Neustadt was on trial
for murder. During the years 1897 and 1898 the defendant had been
employed by the Provost Merkel in Neustadt. As a result of intimate
relations with her employer, she gave birth to a daughter in June
last. The child was placed with her relatives. The provost paid $2
for the child’s board during each of the first two months, but then
refused to meet any further expenses. As the girl could not meet
the expenses for the child’s maintenance, she decided to do away
with it. On a Sunday during September last she smothered the child
with a pillow. The jury convicted her of murder in the second degree
and admitted extenuating circumstances. The public prosecutor moved
to inflict the maximum penalty, five years imprisonment. The judge
sentenced her to three years in prison.”
Thus the seduced and forsaken woman, disgraced and desperate, is
driven to the utmost, and kills her own offspring. Then she is
brought to trial and is sentenced to long periods of imprisonment,
or even to death. But the real unscrupulous murderer is allowed to
go unpunished. Perhaps shortly after the tragedy he will marry a
girl from some good and righteous family, and will become a highly
honored and pious man. Many a man is held in great esteem who thus
polluted his honor and his conscience. ~If women had a voice in the
making and administration of the laws things would be different.~
Evidently many cases of infanticide are never discovered. In July,
1899, in Frankenthal on the Rhine a servant girl was accused of
having drowned her new-born, illegitimate child in the Rhine. The
public prosecutor asked all police departments along the Rhine from
Ludwigshafen to the boundary of Holland to report whether within
a definite time the body of a child had been washed ashore. The
surprising result of this inquest was, that the police departments
within the stated time reported no less than 38 bodies of infants
that had been fished from the Rhine, but whose mothers had not been
found.
The most cruel system is resorted to, as previously stated, by the
French legislation, which forbids to seek the father, but instead
maintains foundling hospitals. The law framed at the convention of
June 28, 1793, reads: “La nation se charge de l’éducation physique
et morale des enfants abandonnés. Désormais, ils seront désignés
sous le seul nom d’orphelins. Aucune autre qualification ne sera
permis” (The nation undertakes the physical and moral education of
abandoned children. Henceforward they will be known only by the
name of orphans. No other designation will be permitted.). That was
a very convenient method to men, for thereby they could turn over
their individual obligations to the community and were spared from
being publicly exposed. National orphan and foundling asylums were
erected. In 1833 the number of orphans and foundlings amounted to
130,945. It was estimated that every tenth child was a legitimate
one that its parents wished to get rid of. As these children were
not properly cared for, their mortality was very great. At that
time 59 per cent. died during the first year; up to the twelfth
year 78 per cent. died; so only 22 from 100 children attained the
twelfth year. At the beginning of the sixties of the last century
there were 175 foundling asylums; in 1861 there were admitted into
these 42,934 enfants trouvés (foundlings), 26,156 enfants abandonnés
(abandoned children) and 9,716 orphans; together this made 78,066
children who were maintained at public expense. All in all the number
of abandoned children has not decreased during recent decades.
Foundling asylums maintained by the state were also established in
Austria and Italy. “Ici on fait mourir les enfants” (here children
are made to die); a monarch is said to have suggested these words
as a suitable inscription for foundling asylums. In Austria the
foundling asylums are gradually disappearing. At present only eight
remain, but at the close of the nineties of the last century these
still contained over 9,000 children, while more than 30,000 children
were placed outside of the asylums. During recent years the number
of foundlings has greatly decreased, for in 1888 there still were
40,865 children who were public charges in Austria; 10,466 were in
asylums; 30,399 were placed in private care. Their maintenance cost
1,817,372 florins. Mortality was not as great among the children
placed in asylums as among those privately cared for; this was
especially so in the province of Galicia. Here, during the year 1888
31.25 per cent. died in asylums--far more than in the asylums of
other countries; but of those who were privately cared for 84.21 per
cent. died; a wholesale butchery. It seems as if Polish mismanagement
endeavored to kill off these poor, little creatures as quickly as
possible.
In Italy 118,531 children were admitted into asylums from 1894 to 1896.
Annual average: 29,633; boys: 58,901; girls: 59,630; illegitimate,
113,141; legitimate, 5,390 (only 5 per cent.). How great the mortality
has been may be seen from the following table.[117]
1890–1892 1893–1896 1897
Number of children admitted 91,549 109,899 26,661
Died during first year 34,186 41,386 9,711
Percentage 37.3 37.6 36.4
Mortality of illegitimate
children in Italy 25.0 27.2 23.4
Mortality of legitimate
children 18.0 17.5 15.9
The record was broken by the foundling asylum Santa Cosa
dell’Annunziata in Naples, where in 1896 of 853 infants 850 died. In
the year 1907 the foundling asylums admitted 18,896 children. During
the years 1902 to 1906 the mortality of these unfortunate little
ones was 37.5 per cent; that means that more than one-third of the
children maintained by the state die during the first year.[118]
It is a generally known fact, that the rate of mortality is always
higher among illegitimate children than among legitimate ones.
According to Prusian statistics the following number of deaths of
infants occurred for every 10,000 births.
1881–1885 1886–1890 1891–1895 1896–1900 1904
Legitimate City 211 210 203 195 179
Country 186 187 187 185 172
Illegitimate City 398 395 385 374 333
Country 319 332 336 336 306
“It is a striking fact which clearly shows the connection between
prostitution and the unfortunate condition of servant girls and menials
employed in the country, that of 94,779 illegitimate children born
in 1906, 21,164 were the children of servant girls and 18,869 were
the children of girls otherwise employed in the country. Together
this made 40,033 or 42 per cent. If servants employed in the country
and female farm hands are taken together, they constitute 30 per
cent., while girls industrially employed constitute 14 per cent
(13,460).”[119]
The difference in the rate of mortality between legitimate and
illegitimate children is especially marked during the first month,
when the mortality of illegitimate children is on an average ~three
times as great~ as that of legitimate children. Lack of care during
pregnancy and during the confinement and improper care of the
child after birth are the simple causes of this great mortality of
illegitimate children. Ill treatment and neglect help to increase
the number of the victims. The number of still-born children is
greater among the illegitimate than among the legitimate also. This
is probably chiefly due to attempts on the part of the mother to
bring about the death of the child during pregnancy.
To this must be added the cases of infanticide that are not found
out because the murdered child is counted among the still-born.
Bertillon claims, that to the 205 cases of infanticide recorded
in the legal documents of France, should be added at least 1,500
alleged still-births and 1,400 cases of intentional killing by
starvation.[120]
The following table shows the number of legitimate and illegitimate
children in various European countries for every 100 still-births.
========================================================
During the years Legitimate Illegitimate
--------------------------------------------------------
Germany 1891–1900 3.15 4.25
Prussia 1900–1902 3.02 4.41
Saxony 1891–1900 3.31 4.24
Bavaria 1891–1900 2.98 3.61
Wurtemberg 1891–1900 3.30 3.48
Baden 1891–1900 2.62 3.35
Austria 1895–1900 2.64 3.86
Switzerland 1897–1903 3.40 6.14
France 1891–1895 4.40 7.54
Netherlands 1891–1900 4.38 8.13
Denmark 1893–1894 2.40 3.20
Sweden 1891–1895 2.46 3.30
Norway 1891–1900 2.47 4.06
Finland 1891–1900 2.54 4.43
Italy 1891–1896 3.89 5.16[121]
--------------------------------------------------------
The survivors revenge themselves on society for the ill-treatment
accorded them by furnishing an ~unusually high~ percentage of the
criminals of all grades.
[106] Dr. Licard de Planzoles--La Fonction Sexuelle. Paris, 1908.
[107] Kamillo Karl Schneider--The Prostitute and Society--a
Sociological and Ethical Study, Leipsic, 1908.
[108] Karl Marx, Capital.
[109] Ibid.
[110] Berlin, 1893.
[111] Max Taube, M. D.--Protection of Illegitimate Children, Leipsic,
1893, Veit & Co.
[112] Berlin, 1889, Wm. Iszleib.
[113] In a pamphlet on “Capital and the Press,” Berlin, 1891, Dr. F.
Mehring relates that a talented actress was employed at a well
known theatre at a monthly salary of $25, while the expenses for
her wardrobe amounted to $250 in a single month. The difference was
made up by a “friend.”
[114] At the conference of the purity societies on September 20,
1894, at the instance of Dr. Wagner an investigation was decided
upon. The results of this investigation have been published in two
volumes, entitled: The Sexual Morality of Protestant Country People
in the German Empire, 1895–1896.
[115] Prof. S. Bettman--Medical Supervision of Prostitutes. Handbook
of the social science of medicine, Jena, 1905.
[116] Ibid.
[117] S. Turcranji and S. Engel. The Foundling System in Italy.
Quarterly journal of public hygiene, 1903.
[118] Encyclopedia of Social Science; 3d edition, vol. iv., 1909.
Article: Foundling Asylums.
[119] Encyclopedia of Social Science, 1909.
[120] Schnapper Arndt.
[121] F. Prinzing--The Causes of Still-Births. General records of
statistics, 1907.
5.--Crimes Against Morality and Sexual Diseases.
We must still briefly dwell upon another evil that is often met with.
An excess of sexual enjoyment is far more harmful than the want
of same. An organism abused by excesses is eventually destroyed.
Impotence, sterility, idiocy, feeble mindedness and other diseases
result. Temperance in sexual intercourse is as necessary as temperance
in eating and drinking, and other human requirements. But young men
living in luxury seem to find it very difficult to be temperate.
Therefore we often find senility among young men of the upper classes.
The number of old and young roués is large, and because they are
satiated and dulled by excesses, they require special stimulants.
Beside those in whom love for their own sex (sodomy) is innate, there
are many who succumb to this perversity of the Greek age. Sodomy is
far more widespread than most of us imagine; the secret documents
of many police departments might reveal appalling facts.[122]
Among the women, too, the perversities of ancient Greece have been
revived. Lesbian, or Sapphic love is, so Taxel claims, prevalent to
an enormous degree among the fashionable ladies of Paris. In Berlin
about a quarter of the prostitutes indulge in this perverse passion
and it is not unknown among the fashionable women, either.
Another unnatural satisfaction of the sexual desire are the criminal
assaults upon children that have greatly increased during the last
decades. The following numbers of persons were convicted of crimes
against morality in Germany: In 1895, 10,239; in 1905, 13,432; in
1906, 13,557. Among those were 58 persons in 1902 and 72 in 1907,
who were convicted of criminal assaults upon children. The following
number was convicted of fornication with persons under fourteen: In
1902, 4,090; in 1906, 4,548; in 1907, 4,397. In Italy the number of
crimes against morality was: 1887 to 1889, 4,590; 1903, 8,461; which
is 19.44 per cent. and 25.67 per cent. for every 100,000 inhabitants.
The same fact has been observed in Austria. Very correctly H. Herz
says: “The rapid increase in crimes against morality during the
period 1880–1890 shows that the present economic structure with its
decrease in the marriage rate and its instability of employment is
in no small degree the cause of the low standard of morality.”[123]
In Germany members of the learned professions furnish about 5.6 per
cent of the criminals; but they furnish about 13 per cent. of those
convicted of criminal assaults upon children. This percentage would
be higher still if members of those circles would not have ample
means to conceal their crimes. The terrifying revelations made by
the “Pall Mall Gazette” at the close of the eighties of the last
century concerning the criminal abuses of children in England, have
shown the widespread existence of frightful conditions.
Concerning venereal diseases and their increase, the following table,
showing the number of cases treated in German hospitals, contains
valuable information:
Gonorrhoea Syphilis
1877–1879 23,344 67,750
1880–1882 28,700 79,220
1883–1885 30,038 65,980
1886–1888 32,275 53,664
1889–1891 41,381 60,793
1892–1894 50,541 78,093
1895–1897 53,587 74,092
1898–1901 83,374 101,225
1902–1904 68,350 76,678
If we take the average annual number of persons afflicted we find
that within a period of 25 years the cases of gonorrhoea have
increased from 7,781 to 22,750 and those of syphilis from 22,583 to
25,559. The population has increased only by 25 per cent. while the
cases of gonorrhoea have increased by ~182~ per cent and those of
syphilis 19 per cent! We have another statistic that does not cover
many years, but just one single day which shows how many patients
afflicted with venereal diseases were under medical treatment on
April 30, 1900. The Prusian minister of public instruction has
caused this investigation to be made. A list of questions was sent
to every physician in Prussia. Although only 63.5 per cent. of these
replied, the investigation showed that on April 30, 1900, there were
about 41,000 persons in Prusia afflicted with venereal diseases.
11,000 were newly infected with syphilis. In Berlin alone there
were on this day 11,600 persons afflicted with venereal diseases,
among them 3,000 fresh cases of syphilis. For every 100,000 adult
inhabitants, the following number were under medical treatment for
venereal diseases.
Men. Women.
In Berlin 1419 457
“ 17 cities having more than 100,000 inhabitants 999 457
“ 42 cities having 30,000 to 100,000 584 176
“ 47 cities having less than 30,000 450 169
“ other cities and rural communities 80 27
---------------------------------------------------------------
In the entire German Empire 282 92
The cities mainly afflicted are those situated at harbors, college
and garrison towns and large industrial centers (In Koenigsberg for
every 100,000 inhabitants, 2,152 men and 619 women are diseased;
in Cologne 1309 men and 402 women; in Frankfort 1,505 men and 399
women).
Of Berlin Dr. Blaschko says: “In a large city like Berlin annually of
1,000 young men between 20 and 30 years, almost 200, about one-fifth,
become diseased with gonorrhoea and about 24 with syphilis. But the
time during which young men are exposed to venereal infection is
much longer than one year. For some it is five years, for others
ten years and more. After five years of unmarried life then a young
man will become diseased with gonorrhoea once and twice in ten
years. After five years every tenth young man, after eight to ten
years every fifth young man would acquire syphilis. In other words,
of the men who marry after their thirtieth year every one would
have had gonorrhoea twice, and every fourth or fifth one would be
inflicted with syphilis. These figures have been compiled by careful
calculation, and to us physicians who learn of so many misfortunes
that are concealed from the eyes of the world, they do not appear
exaggerated.”
The results of the research of April 30, 1900, are confirmed by a
careful study of this problem in connection with the Prussian army
compiled in 1907 by the surgeon-major, Dr. Schwiening.[124] It was
shown that the various divisions of the army annually show about
the same number of recruits afflicted with venereal diseases. Some
divisions have a particularly large number of cases, especially
the division recruited from the province of Brandenburg. Berlin is
mainly to blame that 2 per cent. of these recruits are diseased.
Dr. Schwiening’s compilation of the percentage of diseased recruits
from the various government districts clearly shows the extension
of venereal diseases among civilians. Of 1,000 enrolled recruits
the following number was afflicted:
1903 1904 1905
Berlin 40.9 37.2 45.2
27 cities having more than 100,000 inhabitants 14.9 16.7 15.8
26 cities having 50,000 to 100,000 inhabitants 11.6 9.6 9.5
33 cities having 25,000 to 50,000 inhabitants 8.2 6.8 9.1
Cities having less than 25,000 inhabitants and
rural communities 4.3 5.0 4.0
State 7.6 8.1 7.8
The greatest number of diseased recruits came from Shoeneberg, having
58.4 for every 1,000 enrolled. In large cities outside of Prussia,
the following numbers were recorded: Hamburg, 29.8; Leipsic, 29.4;
Dresden, 19; Chemnitz, 17.8; Munich, 16.4. According to G. v. Mayer
the increase of venereal diseases for every 1,000 inhabitants from
1903 to 1904 was: Prussia, 19.6; Austria and Hungary, 60.3; France,
27.1; Italy, 85.2; England, 125; Belgium, 28.3; the Netherlands,
31.4; Russia, 40.5; Denmark, 45. The increase in venereal diseases is
especially great in the navy. In the German navy from 1905 to 1906
the number of cases were: On ship-board abroad, 113.6 per thousand;
in domestic waters, 58.8; on land, 57.8. In the English navy there
were in 1905 121.55 cases and in 1906 121.94 cases.
We have seen that our social conditions have produced all sorts
of vices, excesses and crimes that are constantly increasing. The
whole social organism is in a state of unrest by which the women are
most deeply affected. Women are beginning to realize this more and
more and to seek redress. They demand in the first place economic
independence. They demand that women, like men, should be admitted to
all trades and professions according to their strength and ability.
They especially demand the right to practice learned professions.
Are these endeavors justified? Can their aims be realized? Will they
bring relief? These are the questions we must seek to answer.
[122] The trials of Moltke, Lynar and Eulenburg have since revealed
a more revolting picture than one could suspect. They have shown how
widespread is this perversity among the higher strata of society,
especially among military men and in court circles.
[123] Dr. Hugo Herz--Crimes and Criminals in Austria, Tuebingen,
1908.
[124] Director general of the army medical department, Dr. Chumburg,
The Venereal Diseases, Their Nature and Dissemination.