Show PROBATION FOR JUVENILE DELINQUENTS By Frank Connor The following is a portion of a aletter aletter aletter letter recently received from Lawrance Lawrance Law- Law rance ranee Maynard Right in line with your ideas on environment was a recent statement by a Juvenile Court Judge in New Jersey He said that of the many delinquents who came before him during his term termon I on the bench 37 per cent of them I came from homes in which one or more members of the family had been arrested for crime These included mothers fathers sisters and brothers Some were orphans Some were children of divorced parents Some were of mentally deficient parentage Very few came from normal homes The children reared in homes where one or more of the family had been arrested would be victims victims victims vic vic- tims of criminal conscious ness undoubtedly Orphans and children of divorced parents are often left to shift for themselves or confined in homes or institutions institutions institutions I which is far from being reared in normal homes I After the children have gotten into difficulties not much is to tobe tobe tobe be accomplished by telling what might have happened through happy happy happy hap hap- py homes Of course this talk is indulged in and offers an escape from the facing of the problem by society which is itself delinquent from start to finish The necessity necessity necessity sity is the taking of action that will tend to restore the confidence of the child This can be done only by persons in whom the child has confidence The court before whom he comes must be a person in whom his confidence can rest Those who deal with him meanwhile must be persons in whom his confidence confidence confidence con con- can rest All must have havea a knowledge of child life that fits fits them for their work Otherwise the last estate is very liable to be worse than the first Good results are being obtained from the right sort of probation in which the delinquents are placed ed in the care of a person who has the approval of the court and the parents The person in question is responsible to the court for the welfare of the child What happens happens happens hap hap- pens in the arrangement is that the person the parents and the court are working hand in hand to create circumstances favorable to the childs child's development This procedure has been known to bear good fruit in cases that have been downright bad Its virtue lies Iles in inthe inthe inthe the fact that it gives the child every opportunity to make good Incidentally it has worked with hardened criminals too Juvenile delinquents are done rank injustice when they are talked talked talked talk talk- ed of or thought of as hardened criminals Give the children the best treatment that the mind of society has produced They are entitled to it and conditions are going to go from bad to worse unless they get it |