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About The Oregon daily journal. (Portland, Or.) 1902-1972 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 21, 1920)
THE OREGON SUNDAY JOURNAL, PORTLXAND. . SUNDAY MORNING, NOVEMBER 21, , 1920. Women Whose Task Is Directing the Life of Fellow Beings Into Wholesome Channels Where the Light i From Home Firesides Is Bright. Their Measures Are Protective and Preventative. r"-;V lv V,, tf - 'fcrf V3 " "' By Earl C. Brownlee , I VEN the . "smart" boy and his automobile, the average , publie dance hall and public swimming place, add the average jazz music and you have, if you are mathema tician enough to figure with f the aoula of little girls and foolish -women, nine, tenths of the - great problem the : women's ' protective division of the department of pub lic safety of .the city of Portland is fighting day and night to solve. That idealized condition In mod ern law enforcement which upholds the principle that, accused persons are innocent until, proved guilty; that ; human doctrine that preven tion of crime is the valorous part of law enforcement these are the foundation stones upon which the division has been built, so that last year it was capable of deal ing with 038 cases of female de linquency in one form or -another. There are four primary causes for the deliquency of Portland girls, Mrs. J. Q. Frankel, superin tendent of the division, will tell you ' if you probe the, workings rf the department at whose head she has been for the last two and a half years. The causes are those men tioned above: the unbridled boy and his automobile, the average dance hall, the average swimming pool and jazz music. The latter, . Mrs. Frankel will point out, is the minor cause, and an indirect one, ' since it is more the "Jazzy" envi ronment that accompanies such music than the syncopated strains themselves that lead to evil path ways. Under the direction of the Trav elers' aid of the T. W. C.-A., the first protective and , preventive work among Portland women was started in 1905. The basis built by the T. W. C. A. ; was absorbed by the city government in 1908 as a part of the department of public safety - and Mrs. Lola G. Baldwin was placed in charge.: Mrs. Bald win retains that charge, but on ian extended leave of absence, daring , which she has undertaken . very similar work for the federal gov ernment, Mrs. Frankel is the ac tive head of the organization.. It is a serious offense to brand one of the 12 members of ' Mrs. Frankel's force as a' 'police woman," for they are hot that,-in tljte strict sense of! the terra. They ajre "operatives," though they have full police power and wear a con cealed star. Their exercise 'of ar resting authority is confined to emergencies and they do not wear uniforms. Each operative has passed a civil service test and has posted a bond of $1000 to assure the faithful per- . formance of her duty in protection' of women, prevention of crime and education against law violation. In the "run" of its work the division seeks, first, to prevent crime where possible, ,or, second, to protect woman against a repeti tion" of her offense against the statutes. : . "We are working," Mrs. Frankel points out, "to create a " finer, keener conscience: not to punish.", The staff of 12 includes the su perintendent, a secretary and 10 operatives, five doing day work and a similar number working at night. The division " cooperates fully ' with evwy other department In the gov ernment of the city and state and does a staggering amount of work on Its wn behalf. The day oper- tow--: ; 1 .1 .. a? 1.' . ,'.'.v.v, ," ,y.jih'Af "jj".v I , i atives Investigate ' cases, answer j emergency calls," prepare court cases,' interview, women taken to j Jail and attend . them ' in court, I where the average woman has no other friend. j ' Five night workers make invest!-" 1 gations, visit all places of amuse I ment, cover street "beats," observe the meanderings of dapper youths ! and keep a weather ' eye always ' I open for. the boys and men : who : drive about town "picking .up. young girls for joy rides," as Mrs. ; Frankel says. .. . , Some of the -cases the division operatives report from , source's where such things ', would . seem j least probable, make col blood. j boil and make the Bolshevik! seem I a trifling - trouble by comparison. That may best be indicated, per- I haps, by extracts from Mrs. Frank el's report for last year, which. In j the absence 'Of a complete report for 1920, is representative: The division handled 203S cases. r --,,- . ., , , :.'.:. iS'Wi7T .y 1 it ii against which complaint had been filed by at least one of 17 agencies' which cooperate with the division. Of these cases 129 were incorri gible girls, 237 were immoral, 503 were suspicious persons, 309 were involved in domestic troubles, 39 were lnsane, 27-were sick,: 291 were runaways or , "missins from home" . cases and the remainder were mis cellaneous cases" Involving the de cidedly criminal. ' ; " ".'Tw A minimum v number of cases ,wre concluded by commitment to jails, and the disposition of cases shows that scores of them, were placed . in proper ' corrective "homes" and schools and in em . ployment where the advice of the mothers who - compose the di vision staff could vbear fruit in their lives. , " In the one year operatives visited 728 dance halls," including, of - course, - repeat visits; 895 grill . rooms, 725 amusement places and . spent a total of 806 hours on street V.c 4 4t 11 9 4', 'y, ' V FJcrros 3eRKA. staff duty. In the same period opera tives visited 106 0 homes. 1242, of fices and hotels and .held 3692 in terviews with girls and women who needed advice. The division, pro vided lodging in 47 cases and meals In 597 cases, at a total cost to the taxpayers, who are eventually ben efited, of 3160.62. Operatives saw 81 of their "clients" married with in the year, too. . The division is working in more or less direct . opposition to tb uniformed police, whose task' it is to bring ! law violators .'to Justice. All of which is perfectly proper In the eyes of the women's division, but it puts a different light on its own duties and seeks, especially in the cases of Juvenile girls, to keep as many as possible out of Juvenile court. In fact, every . possible ad justment of each case is made with this object in view. '' i Because of their public nature and J the difficulty managers ' find s in keeping "personal check on every guest, the hotels come into the at tention of the .division's operatives frequently. Hotel managers -will do most anything the division asks before 4 they ;will submit their houses to the unpleasant publicity that concentrated activity against loose morals, and freely ' flowing liquor would cause., ,, . This condition does exist and to counter' it the women of the di- vision, when they find a violation of the normal moral or legal code, discard; the bombastic, domineer ing practices of their contempo rary' male bluecoats and the case is settled so quietly and thoroughly that perhaps none but the man ager and the operatives know what has been done. "Hotel managers could lessen the need for this division a great deal If they would protect men and womeil by demanding a high stand V ft yyn. .... f ard of conduct in each house," Mrs.' Frankel declares. "This division carries two sepa rate and distinct lines of work. First, the good girl who needs our advice, assistance and protection, and, second, the girl who has transgressed the law in some man ner and' who has a desire to do better. "For instance, 474 girls applied to us in 1919 voluntarily for ad vice and ' help. We advised and aided 440 of them . here and the , others we referred to the proper agencies. h . - "Our policy is not to bring girls and women into jail, nor even into court, but to prevent the commit ment of the act that would lead to jail and court. Givln a first of-, fense to deal with, we try to avoid a second offense. "Our records here show that a woman falls into evil ways men tally and morally through love, to. be candid. Therefore, we accept the belief that she can be redeemed by love better than by law and . tjiat phase, of its application that leads to jail cells and unpleasant, unquenchable notoriety. "It is a fact apparently well es tablished that a woman falls lower into the mire of lawlessness and sin than does man, because woman is naturally on a higher plane in her ideal. "Many women feel, when they " have once transgressed, that their cases are hopeless. Who ever beard tell of the man Who enter tains such an idea? ' "The division has been scored at times for answering anonymous calls for investigation. While we . do not welcome anonymity, we are forced by circumstances to respond and through such calls we have . found some of the most flagrant cases we have ever had to. deal with. ' "But referring: back to our policy tr of prevention and protection as opposed to: detection and incarce ration, it la not only my own opin ft. ion, but that of many others, that our work is fundamentally differ ent from that of the uniformed po lice department and Its branches; that the women's protective di vision could do much better work if we were not located at police headquarters. i "Many women and girls would come to us voluntarily were it not for the fact that they must come through the man-crowded corri dors 'of the police station, where, usually without cause, she is em barrassed and backward. We want, girls and. women to solicit our help, .and we would like a proper en- vironment in which to receive all manner of visitors who would come to us. . "We have found Chief of Police Jenkins an excellent compatriot and ally in our work, but the gen eral atmosphere of a police station cannot be overcome by his splendid cooperation alone" The division is supported entirely by the city through its budget al lotment for police work and, aside from its office quarters at police " headquarters, maintains two deten tion rooms where Juvenile girls are held.v when necessary, overnight. There is no third degree -chamber, no cells with immense Iron bars, but an atmosphere as pleas antly wholesome as conditions amid such surroundings -will per mit. There are no dignified uniforms to awe the uninitiated and calm the ' hardened sinner; there are no glis tening firearms to brandish in the faces of culprits. Such things are taboo where love supplants punish ment, as far as humanly possible. io rranted Mrs. Frankel and her associate have not been hardened to the business of correction that they Interpret their "police" duties to be, and there is a great deal of sympathy for human frailty and youthful wrongdoing manifested in the little staff that has undertaken the huge job of preventing the deg radation of girls whose greatest crime is in having no home, no mother and no care. "'"vVe are seldom, if ever,, called upon to redeem the girl who Is reared within the glare of the flames of a friendly firelight from the home hearth." Mrs. Frankel declares. "We insist that normal . pleasures and moral perfection are attainable in the atmosphere .of a' real home, while it ts the slovenly home, guided by a careless, 'negli gent mother and an overindulgent father, that is producing member ship for our shoplifting clubs among 12-year-old girls and men tal and moral degeneracy among young girls and women old enough to know better on their own ac counts, v.: -'-J: . "Mothers who know where their girls, are after school, after dinner and, in fact, all the time, as moth ers should,; very seldom have seri ous' trouble with their daughters. But woe is the lot of the fond par ent who qverindulges the daugh ter's habit of spending the night with a girl friend. Half the time mother doesn'tHtnow who the girl friend is, and the rest of the time she doesn't kndw that the best place for any Juvenile, girl or boy, after nightfall, Is at home. Joy riding, public dancing and Jazzy: atmospheres are not the proper sports and environments of young womanhood and they probably never will be. . "I am not giving you extracts from a sermon, but statements on actual conditions as we find them right here in Portland right where we can put our fingers on them in absolute substantiation of every charge we may make in our desire to get all Portland girls back within the, family circle, in their own homes, where they belong." " The women's protective division comprises the following operatives, as shown in the picture herewith, reading from the left: Mercedes Flint,- Martha Itondall, Helen Burntrager, Myrtle Keiser, Carry 8.: Turner, Louise H. Blake, Elizabeth Moorad, assistant super intendent; Sophie E, King, Mrs. John F. Carroll and, seated, Mrs. Frankel. i Mrs. Grace B. NJckerson, dance hall inspector, and one of 12 operatives, la shown in Insert. and where innocence until guilt is proved.
