On page 12, in line 5, strike out the following words: "to public

officers.

On page 13, in line 1, strike out the following words: "in order to enable.

On page 13, in lines 2 and 3, strike out the following words: "to perform the duty hereby imposed upon him he."

On page 13, in line 20, after the word "and" insert the word "if." On page 14, in line 1, strike out the following words: "judge of the" and insert in lieu thereof the following word: "said."

On page 14, in line 1, strike out the word "who" and insert in lieu thereof the word "which."

Add the following to said bill as sections 23, 24, and 25:

SEC. 23. The marshal of the District of Columbia is authorized and directed to designate one of his deputies to serve at the juvenile court, where he shall perform such services as are required by the presiding judge.

SEC. 24. In all cases where any child shall be found to be a delinquent child, as defined in section nine of this act, the parent or parents, legal guardian, or person having the custody of such child, or any other person responsible for, or by any act encouraging, causing, or contributing to the delinquency of such child, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon trial and conviction thereof in the juvenile court of the District of Columbia, which is hereby given jurisdiction, shall be fined in a sum not exceeding two hundred dollars or imprisoned in the District jail for a period not exceeding three months, or by both such fine and imprisonment. The court may impose conditions upon any person found guilty under this act, and as long as such person shall comply therewith to the satisfaction of the court, the sentence imposed may be suspended.

SEC. 25. That one-half of the expenses hereby incurred under the provisions of this act shall be paid by the District of Columbia and one-half by the United States. The proposed legislation is suggested by the Commissioners of the District of Columbia. The bill has been carefully considered by your committee and many important amendments suggested. The necessity for the proposed legislation is very fully set forth by the communication of the Commissioners in their letter of April 8, 1904, submitted with the draft of the proposed measure. The reasons of the Commissioners are very fully set forth in a communication submitted to the Senate on January 6, 1904. These communications are submitted herewith and made a part of this report.

The legislation has attracted very general attention of individuals and public bodies in the city, and different resolutions and communications are submitted herewith and made a part of this report.

OFFICE COMMISSIONERS OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,

Washington, April 8, 1904.

DEAR SIR: The Commissioners of the District of Columbia have the honor to transmit herewith a draft of "A bill to create a juvenile court in and for the District of Columbia," and to recommend its early enactment.

This measure is designed to carry out the recommendation made by the Commissioners in their special report to Congress, dated January 6, 1904, on the future care of delinquent and dependent children in the District of Columbia (published as Senate Doc. No. 85, 58th Cong., 2d sess.). It is modeled on the best results of experience of officials engaged in that sphere of activity, and on legal enactment on the subject elsewhere. The Commissioners have consulted those officials, and others here, who, by special knowledge on the subject, were qualified to advise them, and believe that the proposed measure embodies the best ideas obtainable and adapted to conditions in the District of Columbia.

Very respectfully,

Hon. J. H. GALLINGER,

HENRY B. F. MACFARLAND, President Board of Commissioners, District of Columbia.

Chairman Committee on the District of Columbia, United States Senate.

OFFICE COMMISSIONERS DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,
Washington, January 6, 1904.

SIR: The act of Congress entitled "An act making appropriations to provide for the expenses of the government of the District of Columbia for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1904, and for other purposes," approved March 3, 1903, contains the following provisions, namely:

"The Commissioners are required to report to Congress at the first regular session of the Fifty-eighth Congress a general plan for the future care of the delinquent and dependent children in the District of Columbia."

In compliance with this requirement the Commissioners of the District of Columbia have the honor to report to Congress the following general plan for the future care of the delinquent and dependent children in the District of Columbia.

Congress should provide for a juvenile tribunal before which all children, delinquent or dependent, who are to become a charge upon the public funds, should be brought. This tribunal should be entirely separate from all existing courts. It should be accommodated in a separate building, which should also contain the house of detention. The District government should own the building to be thus used for a house of detention and a juvenile tribunal.

No child should be placed in any institution at public expense until the fact of delinquency or dependency has been first ascertained and declared by the juvenile tribunal.

All children of the class now committed to the Reform School for Boys and the Reform School for Girls should be committed by the juvenile tribunal to those schools. All other children, delinquent or dependent (with exception of a class noted later) should be placed by the tribunal in the care of the Board of Children's Guardians, which board should be appointed by the Commissioners of the District of Columbia. The juvenile tribunal should place upon probation, under the care of the Board of Children's Guardians and its probation officers, who should be as numerous as may be necessary, such children as are now so placed by the police court. All other children committed to the care of the Board of Children's Guardians should be made its wards until maturity, as is now done, with provisions for the relinquishment of the guardianship in individual cases by the Board of Children's Guardians with the approval of the juvenile tribunal. Most cases where a parent (or parents) desires to have a child temporarily cared for in some period of family distress can, and would, be handled by private charitable institutions without public aid.

The Board of Children's Guardians, the official agency created by Congress for the public child-caring work, which has successfully performed its functions, as prescribed by Congress from time to time, for ten years, should be given whatever additional authority and enlargement of its administrative force are necessary. It should be left free to exercise its discretion as to the disposition to be made of its wards, within certain broad lines of policy and with certain facilities for dealing with particular classes.

In general its policy should be, as it has been, to provide homes in families for all its infant wards, and for all others who are fitted for home life and for whom fitting homes with due regard for racial and religious considerations can be found. In general, in the future as in the past, the board should place in institutions only those who are not fitted for home life or for whom suitable homes can not be immediately provided. In all cases due consideration must be given to opportunities for educational and especially industrial training.

Applying these principles, the Board of Children's Guardians would place the larger number of its wards in families, either as boarders or otherwise. It would place in institutions only special classes of children, and in almost all cases only for limited periods.

It should be given an adequate number of employees to properly supervise the care of its wards in families and to see that they receive educational and other advantages. It should be provided with ample institutional facilities, though not under its control, but rather under the control of the Commissioners of the District of Columbia, to care for all the children who could not immediately be placed in families. Institutions entirely supported by public funds should be directly coordinated to this end, and the board should be authorized to make contracts for such service as it may require from private institutions supported by private funds.

The Industrial Home School, now a public institution under the control of the Commissioners and supported entirely by public funds, should be the principal receiving and training home for white wards of the Board of Children's Guardians, who should be placed there by the authority of the Board of Children's Guardians. No other children should be placed in that institution. When the larger part of the property now occupied by it is sold to the United States, as Congress will probably

direct in the near future, for the convenience of the United States Naval Observatory, the rest should be sold to private purchasers and the institution should be removed to a larger site in the country.

If the new site be large enough, provision could be made for the care in cottages of feeble-minded white children, now sent to the institution at Elwyn, Pa., and for epileptic children, for whom there is no place but the Government Hospital for the Insane.

Those colored wards of the Board of Children's Guardians, who for any reason should not be placed in families, would probably require two institutions. The National Association for Relief of Destitute Colored Women and Children, now practically maintained entirely at public expense, should either be made a public institution directly under the authority of the Commissioners of the District of Columbia, and then used as an institution for the care of wards of the Board of Children's Guardians, or, if it be continued under its present private management, it should receive public money as compensation through contract with the Board of Children's Guardians for the care of its wards. In either event provision should be made in addition for furnishing temporary care at this institution for colored children in cases where it seemed probable that the children would within a short time be returned to their parents, inasmuch as such care is not provided for colored children as it is for white children by private institutions supported by private charity. (This is the exceptional class noted.) But this should be done under public authority and for specific compensation. The Board of Children's Guardians might supervise this feature of the work under the direction of the Commissioners of the District of Columbia.

The other institution that would be required for colored wards of the Board of Children's Guardians would be an industrial home school directly under the supervision of the Commissioners corresponding to the present Industrial Home School for white children. It should be outside of the city of Washington, on a comparatively large tract of good land, adapted especially to truck farming, but affording opportunity for general industrial and agricultural training. Cottages could be provided for the care of feeble-minded colored children and for those who are afflicted with epilepsy. The Elwyn institution will no longer receive feeble-minded colored children, and no other institution has yet been found that will take them. It is clear that for the sake of the community, as well as for the sake of these children, they should be isolated. The industrial home school for colored children would accommodate both boys and girls, like the present Industrial Home School for white children.

All children maintained by public funds, whether they be delinquent or dependent, or both, should be ascertained by public authority to be proper subjects for the public care, and that care should be administered by public authority. No institution maintained in whole or in part by direct appropriations from public funds should be able to decline to receive public dependents appropriate to its purposes, nor should it be able to receive such public dependents independently of public authority. As it is now, such institutions can not in some instances be required to take public dependents, and can admit any child, even after it has been officially declared after careful investigation to be not a proper subject for public charity. Even the Industrial Home School, now a public institution, can not be required to receive dependents, and can receive a child whom the authorities have refused to make a charge upon the public funds.

It is equally important that there should be one central authority for the supervision of the care of all delinquent and dependent children received as public charges and not committed to the Reform School as of the distinctively criminal class. Whether these children are placed in private or public homes, in families, or in institutions, they should be kept under close observation by officials representing the community and zealous for the interests alike of the children and the taxpayers. So far as the children are concerned the object to be kept in view should be the development of the individual from a state of dependence to a state of independence, including a reformation in case of delinquency-and excluding the hopelessly feeble minded-by such education through the environment and formal instruction as will best fit the child for good citizenship and private usefulness. Each case must be treated separately so as to be treated appropriately; therefore it should first be sifted out by a proper tribunal and then, having been committed to a public guardian, the child should be placed for nuture and instruction wherever in the whole range of the system it may be most advantageous for the child.

The State can not and would not discourage private philanthropy, and the outlined system leaves a perfectly free field for private institutions, but they should receive neither public dependents nor public money, except through public channels and under public supervision.

So far as the question of expense is concerned, it seems reasonable to expect that if such a system should be adopted there would be a reduction in the cost of maintenance of the public dependents which would be greater than any possible increase in the cost of administration, and that the general result would be more economical as well as more efficient.

The Board of Children's Guardians of the District of Columbia was established by act of Congress approved July 26, 1892, but it did not begin to receive and care for children until July 1, 1893. It consists of nine members, serving without compensation, each for a term of three years, under the appointment of the judges of the police court and the judges holding the criminal court of the District of Columbia. The board is the legal guardian of all children committed to it by the court, "and" says the act of July 26, 1892, "shall have full power to board them in private families, to board them in institutions willing to receive them, to bind them out or apprentice them, or to give them in adoption to foster parents." The declared purpose of Congress in establishing this board was to reform the administration of the public child-caring work in the District of Columbia, then in the hands of private institutions, not coordinated into a system and not under governmental control, and also to improve the treatment of dependent children. The principle Congress had in view was to provide for a judicial ascertainment of the need of public support for children and then to centralize authority and responsibility for the care of children properly chargeable to public funds. All classes of dependent and delinquent children, except those properly belonging to the reform schools and including the feeble-minded, were placed in the care of this board.

It

In the ten years the Board, through its agents, has investigated 7,330 cases. has had 1,437 permanent wards and 1,111 temporary wards, or an average per year of 733 cases investigated, 143 permanent wards, and 111 temporary wards. On the 1st of December, 1903, the Board had 1,042 permanent wards. Of these, 369 were white and 673 colored; 697 were boys and 345 girls; 200 were in institutions, for whom board was paid; 116 in private homes, for whom board was paid; 670 in free homes, costing nothing except the expense of supervision, which, according to the latest report of the Board of Guardians, was $11.21 per annum per capita. Free homes have been found chiefly in the States contiguous to the District of Columbia, although a few have been found in the Northern and Western States. Children in these homes are regularly visited and are kept in touch with the office of the Board. While there have been some failures in the placing of children in free homes, the generally successful experience for ten years has confirmed the belief that placing dependent children as soon as possible in family homes is wise, with regard both to public policy and the best interests of the children involved.

The Board has no institution of its own or under its control, but utilizes public institutions by agreement and private institutions by contract, as the needs of the children require. Care is taken to give full weight to religious and racial considerations, and the education of the children is kept continually in view.

Under the act of Congress approved March 3, 1901, the functions of the Board of Children's Guardians were enlarged so as to provide for investigation of cases of alleged delinquency or dependency of children required of it by the courts, and also for the supervision of children placed on probation by the courts as the result of such investigation. For this service one probation officer has been provided, but a larger number is required, as in the case of general agents of the Board. The Board ought also to be given larger appropriations for administrative work.

The act approved March 3, 1893, provides:

"That the authority for placing feeble-minded children of the District of Columbia, heretofore given to the Secretary of the Interior, is hereby transferred to the Board of Children's Guardians."

The number of pupils supported at Elwyn at present is 35, 29 of whom are white and 6 colored. While no additional colored children will be received at Elwyn, none have been discharged on account of color, and those there will probably be maintained indefinitely.

The average number of colored pupils at Elwyn annually up to the time the authorities at that institution refused to receive that class of pupils was from 12 to 15. Only two other colored children of this class are now in charge of the Board of Children's Guardians, and they are placed in a private family.

The institutions maintained or aided by public funds, which care for dependent children, are as follows:

First. The Industrial Home School, a puplic institution entirely supported by public funds, but which can not under the law be required to admit children by any public authority. It receives wards of the Board of Children's Guardians and it also receives children without regard to any other action than that of the committee on admissions of its own board of management.

Second. The National Association for the Relief of Destitute Colored Women and Children, a private institution practically maintained at public expense but not under public control, maintains a daily average of 100 dependent children, all of whom are received through its own board of management without reference to public authorities. It receives an annual appropriation of $9,800, and has practically no other revenue. It has no adequate means of finding homes for children in its care or of supervising the homes in which children may be placed by it.

Third. The Washington Hospital for Foundlings, a private institution, receives foundling children, without investigation, as a rule, and without reference to public authorities. It receives an annual appropriation of $6,000, and about $1,500 is contributed annually from private sources. The daily average number of children in the institution is about 35. When these are placed out they are legally adopted by private families. Fourth. St. Ann's Infant Asylum, a private institution, admits children from infancy up to 6 years of age. Most of the children under its care are later returned to their parents or transferred to other institutions. They are admitted without reference to public authorities. The institution receives $5,400 annually from public funds. The daily average number is about 100.

Fifth. The German Orphan Asylum, a private institution, maintains a daily average of about 45 children. These children are admitted by the management without reference to the public authorities. It receives an annual appropriation of $1,800. It has a considerable endowment fund, and for years the private contributions have been more than sufficient to meet the running expenses.

Sixth. The Working Boys' Home and Children's Aid Association, a private institution, which for many years, under the name of the Newsboys and Children's Aid Society, has been engaged largely in the temporary care of dependent children, maintaining a daily average of about 25, admitted by its own management without regard to public authorities. It has been receiving an annual appropriation of about $1,000, and private contributions of a somewhat larger amount. Recently it has changed the character of its work very materially, and its chief purpose now is to provide a home with wholesome surroundings for working boys, most of whom come from places outside of the District of Columbia.

Besides these there are other institutions, private in character, in the District of Columbia, which care for children, but receive no appropriations from public funds. The Board of Children's Guardians makes contracts with any of these institutions which it may find useful.

The act approved February 23, 1865, provides:

"That the Secretary of the Interior be, and he is hereby, authorized to cause all indigent blind children who are now or may hereafter become entitled, under the law as it now exists, to instruction in said institution, to be instructed in some institution for the education of the blind, in Maryland or some other State, at a cost not greater for each pupil than is, or may be, for the time being, paid by such State, and to cause the same to be paid out of the Treasury of the United States."

The act approved March 3, 1899, provides that "Hereafter one-half of the indefinite appropriation to pay for the instruction of the indigent blind children of the District of Columbia, formerly instructed in the Columbia Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf, Dumb, and Blind, shall be paid out of the revenues of the District of Columbia and the other half out of the Treasury of the United States." The number of blind children cared for at the Maryland School for the Blind, under authority of the above provision, is from 25 to 30, and the rate paid per pupil is $300 per annum.

THE REFORM SCHOOL FOR BOYS.

An act approved July 1, 1862, incorporated the "Guardian Society to Reform Juvenile Offenders in the District of Columbia."

By act approved July 25, 1866, funds of the Guardian Society having become exhausted, Congress established a "House of Correction for Boys in the District of Columbia." This institution was located on the Government Farm. Its government was vested in a board of trustees "commissioned by the President of the United States, one of the said trustees being nominated by the mayor of Washington, one by the mayor of Georgetown, one by the levy court of the county of Washington, and four by the Secretary of the Interior.

By act approved May 6, 1870, the name of the institution was changed to "Reform School of the District of Columbia."

An act approved May 15, 1872, authorized purchase of a new site for the school, and present site at old Fort Lincoln was purchased.

The act approved May 3, 1876, "revising and amending the various acts establishing and relating to the Reform School, etc.," provides for the organization of a