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Show THE "SOCIAL EVIL." j The Woman Suffrage association of: San Francisco has entered an emphatic ; protest against Dr. Holland's plan of( dealing with the "social evil" in that city. There is every probability that ! tho plan proposed will become loumci- i pal law without regard to this protest, j lor the show of virtuo must bo made,, and at the expense of the women, no ' matter how little of it may exist among ' tho men by whose patronage alone houses of ill fame are supported. The ' grave objection, we presume, made by the Association to Dr. Holland's plan i is, that it only recognizes the women as criminals in the immoral practices against which it is directed. It requires re-quires their registration, compels regular reg-ular surgical examinations, and im- . poses upon them certain lines and pen-; alties for a violation of its provisions. All such enactments will prove futile, j If the law declares illicit sexual inter-) course a crime, it is equally so in the ! man as in the woman; and as men are ! in a largo majority of ea-es the direct agents in filling such dens of infamy, , they should be held proportionately responsible. If a registration law is deemed ihe proper method of dealing with this evil in large cities, to be at all effectual it must include both men i and women. Not only should the women who inhabit such placcB be registered, but the men who frequent them should be compelled to regiMer their own names write their own shame and such records should he open lor public inspection. Then, if the sense of the public wxs really directed di-rected against the vice, if all these efforts at its regulation or mi p predion were real and not .-hams, public reprobation repro-bation plainly diuvled agaiu.st the offenders would do mote towards suppressing sup-pressing the evil than any amount of statutory piius and penalties to be imposed im-posed upuu poor victim.": of man's guilt aud their uwu frailly. There are prudNh people who thiuk wouicu should uot interfere with aOch thiu;; nay, that they should leave it to be supposed they do uot kuow of tho existence of such depravity. This is the sheerest balderdash. Women eauuot atf:ct to be ignorant of that which U tiuunud before tbir eyes daily and hourly. They kuuw their sons, husbands, father?, are pairous of such place. They havo sisters and daughters who may bo made the prey oi designing mst anj dragged down to infamy. Kvery "soiled dove" was somebody's daughter; xnd women should not only admit that they know of its existence, but should enter a protest pro-test against all existing legislation concerning con-cerning it that would be heard and felt thrtvioti.w wa-U I |