Part 6

The chief progress in the direction of adequate protection for children prior to 1889 lay less in positive legal enactment on the subject than in the institution of an effective system of police, whereby it became possible to discover and repress cruelty punishable under the ordinary law. It is quite inaccurate to say that children had very few rights in England, or that animals were better protected. But before the constitution of the present police force, and in the absence of any proper system of public prosecution, it is undeniable that numberless cases of neglect and ill-treatment went unpunished and were treated as nobody's business, because there was no person ready to undertake in the public interest the protection of the children of cruel or negligent parents. In 1889 a statute was passed with the special object of preventing cruelty to children. This act was superseded in 1894 by a more stringent act, which was repealed by the Prevention of Cruelty to Children Act 1904, in its turn superseded for the most part by the Children Act 1908, which introduced many new provisions in the law relating to children and specifically deals with the offence of "cruelty" to them. This offence can only be committed by a person over sixteen in respect of a child under sixteen of whom he has "custody," "charge" or "care." The act presumes that a child is in the custody of its parents, step-parents, or a person cohabiting with its parent, or of its guardians or persons liable by law to maintain it; that it is in the charge of a person to whom the parent has committed such charge (e.g. a schoolmaster), and that it is in the care of a person who has actual possession or control of it. Cruelty is defined as consisting in assault, ill-treatment (falling short of actual assault), neglect, abandonment or exposure of the child in a manner likely to cause _unnecessary_ suffering or injury to health, including injury to or loss of sight, hearing or limb, or any organ of the body or any mental derangement; and the act or omission must be wilful, i.e. deliberate and intentional, and not merely accidental or inadvertent. The offence may be punished either summarily or on indictment, and the offender may be sent to penal servitude if it is shown that he was directly or indirectly interested in any sum of money payable on the death of the child, e.g. by having taken out a policy permitted under the Friendly Societies Acts. A parent or other person legally liable to maintain a child or young person will be deemed to have "neglected" him by failure to provide adequate food, clothing, medical aid, or lodging, or if in the event of inability to provide such food, &c., by failure to take steps to procure the same under acts relating to the relief of the poor.

These statutes overlap the common law and the statutes already mentioned. Their real efficacy lies in the main in the provisions which facilitate the taking of evidence of young children, in permitting poor law authorities to prosecute at the expense of the rates, and in permitting a constable on arresting the offender to take the child away from the accused, and the court of trial on conviction to transfer the custody of the child from the offender to some fit and willing person, including any society or body corporate established for the reception of poor children or for the prevention of cruelty to children. The provisions of the acts as to procedure and custody extend not only to the offence of cruelty but also to all offences involving bodily injury to a child under sixteen, such as abandonment, assault, kidnapping and illegally engaging a child in a dangerous public performance. The act of 1908 also makes an endeavour to check the heavy mortality of infants through "overlaying,"[1] enacting that where it is proved that the death of an infant under three years of age was caused by suffocation whilst the infant was in bed with some other person over the age of sixteen, and that that person was at the time of going to bed under the influence of drink, that other person shall be deemed to have neglected the child in manner likely to cause injury to its health, as mentioned above. The acts have been utilized with great zeal and on the whole with much discretion by various philanthropic societies, whose members make it their business to discover the ill-treated and neglected children of all classes in society, and particularly by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, which is incorporated under royal charter of the 28th of May 1895, for the purposes _inter alia_ of preventing the public and private wrongs of children, and the corruption of their morals and of taking action to enforce the laws for their protection.

The act of 1908 enacted more stringent provisions against baby-farming (q.v.). The Infant Life Protection Act of 1897 did not apply where only one child was taken, but now by the act of 1908, where a person undertakes for reward the nursing and maintenance of one or more infants under the age of _seven_ years apart from their parents or having no parents, he must give notice in writing to the local authority within forty-eight hours from the reception of the child. If an infant is already in the care of a person without reward and he undertakes to continue the nursing for reward, such undertaking is a reception of the child. The notice to the local authority must state the name, sex, date and place of birth of the infant, the name and address of the person receiving the infant and of the person from whom the infant was received. Notice must also be given of any change of address of the person having the care of the infant, or of the death of the infant, or of its removal to the care of some other person, whose name and address must also be given. It is the duty of local authorities to provide for the carrying-out in their districts of that portion of the act which refers to nursing and maintenance of infants, to appoint infants' protection visitors, to fix the number of infants which any person may retain for nursing, to remove infants improperly kept, &c. Relatives or legal guardians of an infant who undertake its nursing and maintenance, hospitals, convalescent homes, or institutions, established for the protection and care of infants, and conducted in good faith for religious and charitable purposes, as well as boarding schools at which efficient elementary education is given, are exempt from the provisions of the act.

The acts of 1904 and 1908 deal with many other offences in relation to children and young persons. The act of 1904 introduced restrictions on the employment of children which lie on the border land between cruelty and the regulation of child labour. It prohibits custodians of children from taking them, or letting them be, in the street or in public-houses to sing, play, perform or sell between 9 P.M. and 6 A.M. These provisions apply to boys under fourteen and girls under sixteen. There are further prohibitions (1) on allowing children under eleven to sing, play, perform or be exhibited for profit, or offer anything for sale in public-houses or places of public amusement at any hour without a licence from a justice, which is granted only as to children over ten and under stringent conditions; (2) on allowing children under sixteen to be trained as acrobats, contortionists, or circus performers, or for any dangerous performance; and the Children's Dangerous Performances Act 1879, as amended in 1897, makes it an offence to employ a male young person under sixteen and a female under eighteen in a dangerous public performance.

The act of 1908 renders liable to a fine not exceeding £25, or alternatively, or in addition thereto, imprisonment with or without hard labour for any term not exceeding three months, any custodian, &c., of any child or young person who allows him to be in any street, premises or place for the purpose of begging or receiving alms, or of inducing the giving of alms, whether or not there is a pretence of singing, playing, performing or offering anything for sale. An important departure in the act of 1908 was the attempt to prevent the exposure of children to the risk of burning. Any custodian, &c., of a child under seven who allows that child to be in a room Containing an open grate not sufficiently protected to guard against the risk of burning or scalding is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £10. Provision is made against allowing children between the ages of four and sixteen to be in brothels; it is also made a misdemeanour if any custodian, &c., of a girl under sixteen causes or encourages her seduction or prostitution, and any person having the custody of a young girl may be bound over to exercise proper care if it is shown to the satisfaction of a court of summary jurisdiction, on the complaint of any person, that she is exposed to such risk.

The act of 1908, following legislation in many parts of the United States and in some of the British colonies, places a penalty on selling tobacco to any person apparently under the age of sixteen, whether for his own use or not. It empowers constables and park keepers to seize tobacco in the possession of any person apparently under sixteen found smoking in any street or public place, as well as to search them; it also empowers a court, of summary jurisdiction to prevent automatic machines for the sale of tobacco being used by young persons. The act also contains useful provisions empowering the clearing of a court whilst a child or young person is giving evidence in certain cases (e.g. of decency or morality), and the forbidding children (other than infants in arms) being present in court during the trial of other persons; it places a penalty on pawnbrokers taking an article in pawn from children under fourteen; and on vagrants for preventing children above the age of five receiving education. It puts a penalty on giving intoxicating liquor to any child under the age of five, except upon the orders of a duly qualified medical practitioner, or in case of sickness, or other urgent cause; also upon any holder of the licence of any licensed premises who allows a child to be at any time in the bar of the licensed premises; or upon any person who causes or attempts to cause a child to be in the bar of licensed premises other than railway refreshment rooms or premises used for any purpose to which the holding of a licence is merely auxiliary, or where the child is there simply for the purpose of passing through to some other part of the premises. It makes provision for the safety of children at entertainments, and consolidates the law relating to reformatory and industrial schools, and to juvenile offenders (see JUVENILE OFFENDERS).

In the act of 1908, "child" is denned as a person under the age of fourteen years, and "young person" as a person who is fourteen years and upwards and under the age of sixteen years. The act applies to Scotland and Ireland. In the application of the act to Ireland exception is made relative to the exclusion of children from bars of licensed premises, in the case of a child being on licensed premises where a substantial part of the business carried on is a drapery, grocery, hardware or other business wholly unconnected with the sale of intoxicating liquor, and the child is there for the purpose of purchasing goods other than intoxicating liquor.

_British Possessions._--Legislation much on the lines of the acts of 1889-1908 has been passed in many British possessions, e.g. Tasmania (1895, 1906), Queensland (1896, 1905), Jamaica (1896), South Australia (1899, 1904), New South Wales (1892 and 1900), New Zealand (1906), Mauritius (1906), Victoria (1905,1906). In South Australia a State Children's Department has been created to care for and manage the property and persons of destitute and neglected children, and the officials of the council may act in cases of cruelty to children; the legislation of Victoria and Queensland is based on that of South Australia. See also CHILDREN'S COURTS, EDUCATION and LABOUR LEGISLATION. (W. F. C.; T. A. I.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] There has been some doubt as to whether it is more correct to say a person "_overlays_" or "_overlies_" a child, and the question came up in committee on the bill. According to Sir J.A.H. Murray (see Letter in _The Times_, 12th of May 1908) "to lie," an intransitive verb, becomes transitive when combined with a preposition, e.g. a nurse lies over a child or overlies a child; "to lay" is the causal derivative of "to lie," and is followed by two objects, e.g. to lay the table with a cloth, or to lay a cloth on the table; similarly, to overlay a surface with varnish, or to overlay a child with a blanket, or with the nurse's or mother's body. The instrument can be left unexpressed, and a person can be said to overlay a child, i.e. with her own body, a pillow, &c. Thus, while "overlie" covers the case where the woman herself lies over the child, "overlay" is the more general word.

CHILDRENITE, a rare mineral species; a hydrous basic aluminium iron phosphate, orthorhombic in crystallization. The ferrous oxide is in part replaced by manganous oxide and lime, and in the closely allied and isomorphous species eosphorite manganese predominates over iron. The general formula for the two species is Al(Fe, Mn)(OH)2PO2 + H2O. Childrenite is found only as small brilliant crystals of a yellowish-brown colour, somewhat resembling chalybite in general appearance. They are usually pyramidal in habit, often having the form of double six-sided pyramids with the triangular faces deeply striated parallel to their shorter edges. Hardness 4.5-5; specific gravity 3.18-3.24. The mineral, named after the zoologist and mineralogist J.G. Children (1777-1852), secretary of the Royal Society, was detected in 1823 on specimens obtained some years previously during the cutting of a canal near Tavistock in Devonshire. It has also been found in a few copper mines in Cornwall and Devonshire.

Eosphorite occurs as crystals of prismatic habit with angles very nearly the same as those of childrenite. Unlike childrenite, it has a distinct cleavage in one direction, and often occurs in compact masses as well as in crystals. The colour is sometimes yellowish-white, but usually rose-pink, and on this account the mineral was named from [Greek: êosphoros], dawn-bearer. Hardness 5; specific gravity 3.11-3.145. It was discovered in 1878 in a pegmatite-vein at Branchville, Connecticut, where it is associated with other rare manganese phosphates. (L. J. S.)

CHILDREN'S COURTS, or JUVENILE COURTS, a special system of tribunals for dealing with juvenile offenders, first suggested in the United States. The germ of such institutions was planted in Massachusetts in 1869, when a plan was introduced at Boston of hearing charges against children separately, and apart from the ordinary business of the lesser tribunals. No great progress was made in the development of the idea in Massachusetts, as the legal authorities were not fully convinced of the utility or need for a separate court so long as the children were kept strictly apart from adults, and this could be assured by a separate session. But the system of "probation," by which children were handed over to the kindly care and guardianship of an appointed officer, and thus escaped legal repression, was created about the same time in Boston and produced excellent results. The probation officer is present at the judge's side when he decides a case, and is given charge of the offender, whom he takes by the hand, either at his parent's residence or at school, and continually supervises, having power if necessary to bring him again before the judge. The example of Massachusetts in due course influenced other countries, and especially the British colony of South Australia, where a State Children's Department was created at Adelaide in 1895, and three years later a juvenile court was opened there for the trial of persons under eighteen and was conducted with great success, though the system of probation officers was not introduced. A juvenile court was also established at Toronto (Canada) on the South Australian model.

The movement when once fully appreciated went ahead very rapidly. In the United States Illinois was the first state to call a distinct children's court into existence, and Judge Richard Tuthill was the pioneer at Chicago, where the court was established in 1899. Many states followed suit, including New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, Kansas, Colorado, Indiana and others, till the number rose to nineteen in 1906. In New York, where juvenile probation is supervised by the Society for the Protection of Children, there is a separate children's court with rooms attached, where the children for detention wait till they are brought in for trial. Brooklyn has also a children's court. In Pennsylvania, where the juvenile court was at first opposed as unconstitutional, the difficulty was met by first bringing the child before the magistrate in the police court, a course which (though followed by his transferring the case to the special court) perpetuated the very evils the children's court was intended to avoid; the work of probation was, however, most effectively carried out, chiefly by female officers. The Chicago Juvenile Court sits twice weekly under an especially appointed judge, and policemen act as probation officers to some extent. The court of Indianapolis, however, gained the reputation of being the most complete and perfect in the United States. It works with a large and highly efficient band of volunteer probation officers under a chief. The juvenile court of Denver, Colorado, attained remarkable results under Judge B. Lindsey, whose magnetic personality, wonderful comprehension of boy nature, and extraordinary influence over them achieved great results. The court meets once a fortnight, when fresh cases are tried and boys already on probation report themselves, often to the number of two hundred at a time. The latter appear before the judge in batches, each hands in his school report in a sealed letter, and according to its purport receives praise or blame, or he may be committed to the Detention House. An efficient court was also constituted at Baltimore, Maryland, with a judge especially chosen to preside, probation being for fixed periods, varying from three months to three years, and children being brought back to the court for parole or discharge, or, if necessary, committal to the house of one of the philanthropic societies. In Washington, D.C., the system of having no distinct court or judge, but holding a separate session, was followed, and it was found that numbers of children came to the court for help and guidance, looking upon the judge for the time being as their friend and counsellor. Probation in this instance offered peculiar difficulties on account of the colour question, two-thirds of the children having negro blood and a white boy being always preferred for a vacant situation. Throughout, the action of juvenile courts in the United States has been to bring each individual into "human touch" with kindly helpful workers striving to lead the young idea aright and train it to follow the straight path. It was the result always of the effort of private persons and not due to government initiative, indeed the advocates and champions of the system only established it by overcoming strong opposition from the authorities.

Progress in the same direction has been made in England. The home office had recommended London police magistrates to keep children's cases separate from those of adults; the same practice or something analogous obtained in many county boroughs, such as Bath, Birmingham, Bristol, Bolton, Bradford, Hull, Manchester, Walsall, Halifax and others, and the Children Act 1908 definitely established children's courts. This act enacted that courts of summary jurisdiction when hearing charges, &c., against children or young persons should, unless the child or young person is charged jointly with an adult, sit in a different building or room from that in which the ordinary sittings of the court are held, or on different days or at different times. Furthermore, provision must be made for preventing persons apparently under the age of sixteen years whilst being conveyed to or from court, or whilst waiting before or after their attendance in court, from associating with adults, unless such adults are charged jointly with them. The act prohibits any persons other than members and officers of the court, the parties to the case, their solicitors, counsel and other persons directly concerned in the case, from being present in a juvenile court, except by leave of the court. Bona-fide press representatives are also excepted. The main object of the whole system is to keep the child, the embryotic offender who has probably erred from ignorance or the pressure of circumstances or misfortune, altogether free from the taint or contagion that attaches to criminal proceedings. The moral atmosphere of a legal tribunal is injurious to the youthful mind, and children who appear before a bench, whether as accused or as witness, gain a contemptuous familiarity with legal processes.

The most beneficial action of the children's court comes from its association with the system of personal guardianship and close supervision exercised by the probation officers, official and voluntary. Where the intervention of the newly constituted tribunal can not only save the child from evil association when first arrested, but can rescue him without condemnation and committal to prison, its functions may be relied upon to diminish crime by cutting it off at the source. Much depends upon the quality and temperament of the presiding authority. Where a judge with special aptitude can be appointed, firm, sympathetic, tactful and able to gain the confidence of those brought before him, he may do great good, by dealing with each individual and not merely with his offence, realizing that the court does not exist to condemn but to strengthen and give a fresh chance. Where the children's court is only a branch of the existing jurisdiction worked by the regular magistrate or judge fulfilling his ordinary functions and not specially chosen, the beneficial results are not so noticeable. (A. G.)