[_Mr. Weil, one of the best known attorneys of western
Pennsylvania, is known outside of his profession as the militant
President of the Pittsburgh Voters’ League, the organization
which exposed the graft scandals of three years ago, sent
councilmen and bankers to jail and brought new and invigorating
spirit into Pittsburgh municipal life. Last Year the Voters’
League successfully brought charges against the head of the
Department of Public Safety, and provoked a situation which led
to the creation of the Pittsburgh Morals Commission, a
semi-official body without governmental authority, and the
cleaning-up of the big numbered district._
_It is on the basis of this experience that Mr. Weil reaches the
conclusions here set forth. He was a witness before the Wagner
commission which has recommended legislation now pending in New
York (with every prospect of passage) that will create a
separate public welfare department, largely divorce it from the
city administration and entrust its commissioners, appointed by
the mayor, with powers with respect to vice somewhat similar to
those held by the Board of Health with respect to sanitary
conditions._—Ed.]
The police, a body of men selected primarily to preserve order,
protect life, prevent crime, apprehend the criminal, and perform
other administrative duties—men perhaps wholly unfitted as a body
for anything else—have been expected to solve, by legislation,
problems which have confounded the wisest from the time whereof
the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.
That the police have failed could not be otherwise.
That they have aggravated the evil was to be expected.
That ultimately legislation must be placed in competent, qualified
hands, must be apparent.
That it will require the greatest minds, the best thought, the
highest statesmanship, and almost a divine perception, to
apprehend and deal with those complex, involved, intricate
questions having to do with the passions of men and the strongest
laws of nature, urging defiance of human laws, seems to be
axiomatic.
Nevertheless, on the subject of vice as generally understood in
our cities, the police are expected not only to administer the
laws, but to make them; not only to enforce enactments, but to
frame them. And herein lies, in my judgment, the root of the evil
in present day conditions which has brought our police into
disrepute.
All countries, from the most despotic to the most liberal, from
the most conservative to the most radical, have left this question
of the social evil to the police, and have not dared, through
their legislative bodies, to thoroughly consider and pass laws to
eradicate it. Such meager legislation as has been passed has been
ignored in the congested centers of population, and generally such
legislation has not been supported by the public sentiment of
those communities. Legislation has been generally of a merely
prohibitive character, ignoring existing conditions, together with
the army of human beings living upon vice, for whom some provision
must be made.
Even if the legislatures could be induced to take up this question
and pass general laws, it would necessarily follow that such laws
in their generality must look to the future, rather than to the
present, and existing conditions would have to be left to some
other authority.
In every large city there are thousands engaged in prostitution.
They can neither be exterminated by the fiat of law nor reformed
by the passage of proclamations. Public morals, like private
morals, can be improved only gradually. It is not so much the
theoretical question of to be or not to be, but the practical
situation summed up in such phrases as: It is—it will for a time
remain. The future—what is it to be?
Would it not be wise to ask the legislature to pass a law
requiring every city to appoint a body of men to draft, and from
time to time revise, a code of laws to regulate, suppress,
exterminate, and generally to deal with, this problem of
prostitution? To it must be given authority. It must be vested
with legislative power. It should have its own employes—call it a
morals police force, if you wilt—to carry into effect the rules,
regulations and laws passed by this commission. That men could be
obtained to act upon such a commission, public-spirited,
representative students of social questions, I fully believe. No
one would accept a place on such a board who was not interested in
the welfare of his community. The responsibilities would be
fearful; the criticism would be severe. No one without a blameless
life would dare to act. Whether or not ultimately the regular
police force could be used by such a commission would be a
question of policy. At any rate, for the present, I believe it
would be unwise.
Such a commission would collect data of inestimable value, data
that was reliable, and of which there is now none worth while.
Such a commission would doubtless make mistake after mistake,
perhaps would depart from all its preconceived notions at the
start. Nevertheless, it is reasonable to assume that step by step
it would gradually and slowly work out a solution. Looking the
country over, we see that voluntary organizations have
accomplished temporary good, but their effort has never been
persistent, continuous, permanent, authoritative, legal.
The adoption of the plan suggested would take out of the hands of
those wholly unfitted for so great an undertaking this momentous
question, and place it in the hands of others who we would have
the right to assume would ultimately be found to deal with it, so
far as human intelligence, study, observation and experiment can
enable and qualify men to deal with it.
Another and a greatly to be desired result would also be
accomplished. It would remove from the police that which today
contaminates the organization, so that in every city they have
been brought under a suspicion unfortunately too frequently
deserved, an opprobrium too justly applied.
The casting of this burden upon the police, more than any other
cause, sows the seed of corruption, furnishes the opportunity for
profit, brings into alliance the law officers and the
law-breakers, disgraces the police force, and keeps off of it many
men who would otherwise be glad to serve their communities in a
position that should command the respect and consideration of the
people.
This police burden has in turn been the biggest rock upon which
self-government has capsized in our American cities.