ill not even protect. Woe to those who
refuse to pay their toll; they would be rounded up like cattle, "if
only to make a favorable impression upon the good citizens of the
city, or if the powers needed extra money on the side. For the
warped mind who believes that a fallen woman is incapable of human
emotion it would be impossible to realize the grief, the disgrace,
the tears, the wounded pride that was ours every time we were pulled
in."

Strange, isn't it, that a woman who has a kept a "house" should be
able to feel that way? But stranger still that a good Christian
world should bleed and fleece such women, and give them nothing in
return except obloquy and persecution. Oh, for the charity of a
Christian world!

Much stress is laid on white slaves being imported into America. How
would America ever retain her virtue if Europe did not help her out?
I will not deny that this may be the case in some instances, any more
than I will deny that there are emissaries of Germany and other
countries luring economic slaves into America; but I absolutely deny
that prostitution is recruited to any appreciable extent from Europe.
It may be true that the majority of prostitutes in New York City are
foreigners, but that is because the majority of the population is
foreign. The moment we go to any other American city, to Chicago or
the Middle West, we shall find that the number of foreign
prostitutes is by far a minority.

Equally exaggerated is the belief that the majority of street girls
in this city were engaged in this business before they came to
America. Most of the girls speak excellent English, are Americanized
in habits and appearance,--a thing absolutely impossible unless they
had lived in this country many years. That is, they were driven into
prostitution by American conditions, by the thoroughly American
custom for excessive display of finery and clothes, which, of course,
necessitates money,--money that cannot be earned in shops or
factories.

In other words, there is no reason to believe that any set of men
would go to the risk and expense of getting foreign products, when
American conditions are overflooding the market with thousands of
girls. On the other hand, there is sufficient evidence to prove that
the export of American girls for the purpose of prostitution is by no
means a small factor.

Thus Clifford G. Roe, ex-Assistant State Attorney of Cook County,
Ill., makes the open charge that New Engla